DUST 


•wru 


ELLEN  JST.LAMOTTE 


Loading   coolies    at    \Yei-Hei-\\  ci 


PEKING  DUST 


ELLEN  N. 

Author  of  "The  Ba 


ILLUSTRATED 
WITH  PHOTOGRAPHS 


NEW  YORK. 

THE  CENTURY  CO. 

1920 


Copyright,  1919,  by 
THE  CENTUBY  Co. 


Published,  May,  1919 


ftttct 


DS 

73 


INTRODUCTION 

Two  classes  of  books  are  written  about 
China  by  two  classes  of  people.  There  are 
books  written  by  people  who  have  spent  the 
night  in  China,  as  it  were,  superficial  and 
amusing,  full  of  the  tinkling  of  temple  bells; 
and  there  are  other  books  written  by  people 
who  have  spent  years  in  China  and  who  know 
it  well,  —  ponderous  books,  full  of  absolute 
information,  heavy  and  unreadable.  Books  of 
the  first  class  get  one  nowhere.  They  are  de- 
lightful and  entertaining,  but  one  feels  their 
irresponsible  authorship.  Books  of  the  second 
class  get  one  nowhere,  for  one  cannot  read 
them;  they  are  too  didactic  and  dull.  The 
only  people  who  might  read  them  do  not  read 
them,  for  they  also  are  possessed  of  deep, 
fundamental  knowledge  of  China,  and  their 
views  agree  in  no  slightest  particular  with  the 
views  set  forth  by  the  learned  scholars  and 
theorists. 


viii  INTRODUCTION 

This  book  falls  into  neither  of  these  two 
classes,  except  perhaps  in  the  irresponsibility 
of  its  author.  It  is  compounded  of  gossip, 
— the  flying  gossip  or  dust  of  Peking.  Take 
it  lightly;  blow  off  such  dust  as  may  happen 
to  stick  to  you.  For  authentic  information 
turn  to  the  heavy  volumes  written  by  the 
acknowledged  students  of  international  politics. 

ELLEN  N.  LA  MOTTE. 


ACKNOWLEDGMENT 

The  writer  wishes  to  thank  the  fol- 
fowing  friends  who  have  been  kind 
enough  to  lend  the  photographs  used 
in  the  illustrations:  Warren  R.  Austin, 
F.  C.  Hitchcock,  Margaret  Frieder, 
T.  Severin  and  Rachel  Snow. 


CONTENTS 

PART  I 

LETTERS  WRITTEN  OCTOBER  AND  NOVEMBER,  1916 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

I     POOR  OLD  CHINA 3 

II  PEKING 13 

III  CIVILIZATION 24 

IV  RACE  ANTAGONISMS 29 

V  SPHERES  OF  INFLUENCE 39 

VI  ON  THE  SACREDNESS  OF  FOREIGNERS   .      50 

VII     DONKEYS  GENERALLY 61 

VIII     ADVISERS  AND  ADVICE 71 

IX     CHINESE  HOUSES 77 

X  How  IT  's  DONE  IN  CHINA  ....      86 

XI  THE  LAO-HSI-KAI  OUTRAGE  ....      94 

XII  THE  LAO-HSI-KAI  AFFAIR    .      .      .      .101 

XIII  THE  LAO-HSI-KAI  "INCIDENT"  .      .      .108 

PART  II 

LETTERS  WRITTEN  FEBRUARY  AND  MARCH,  1917 

I     THE  RETURN   TO  PEKING    .      .      .      .115 

II     THE  OPIUM  SCANDAL 1£4 

III     THE  WALRUS  AND  THE  CARPENTER  .      .   13£ 


x  CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

IV     CHINA'S  COURSE  CLEAR 139 

V     FEAR  OF  THE  PLUNGE 145 

VI     A  DUST-STORM 150 

VII     A  BOWL  OF  PORRIDGE 164 

VIII     FROM  A  SCRAP-BOOK 172 

IX     THE  GERMAN  REPLY 182 

X     DUST  AND  GOSSIP 189 

XI  DIPLOMATIC  RELATIONS  BROKEN      .      .    198 

XII  WALKING  ON  THE  WALL      .      .      .      .202 

XIII  MEETING  THE  PRESIDENT  OF  CHINA  .      .    208 

XIV  GREAT  BRITAIN'S  TWELVE  DEMANDS    .    220 

XV     CONCLUSION 229 

APPENDIXES  .   231 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS 


Loading  coolies  at  Wei-Hei-Wei  .      .     Frontispiece 


FACING 
PAGE 


Map 3 

Coolies i.      ,.      .      .  20 

Camel  caravan,  Peking 21 

Peking  car 32 

Fruit  stall  in  the  bazaar 33 

Entrance  gate  to  compound  of  Chinese  house  .  84 

Compound  of  Chinese  house 85 

Chinese  funeral 120 

Chinese  funeral 121 

Vice-President  Feng  Kuo-Chang      .      .      .      .128 

View  of  Peking 129 

Village  outside  walls  of  Peking 204 

Fortune  teller 205 

President  Li  Yuan-Hung      .      ..,     ,. .      .  216 

Entrance  to  Winter  Palace  ,.,     .     .......  217 


PART  I 


PEKING  DUST 


POOR   OLD   CHINA 

WHEN"  I  came  away  last  August,  you 
said  you  wanted  me  to  tell  you  about 
our  travels,  particularly  about  China.  Like 
most  Americans,  you  have  a  lurking  sentimen- 
tal feeling  about  China,  a  latent  sympathy  and 
interest  based  on  colossal  ignorance.  Very 
well,  I  will  write  you  as  fully  as  I  can.  Two 
months  ago  my  ignorance  was  fully  as  over- 
whelming as  yours,  but  it  is  being  rapidly  dis- 
pelled. So  I  '11  try  to  do  the  same  for  you, 
as  you  said  I  might.  Rash  of  you,  I  call  it. 

I  '11  take  it  that  you  have  just  about  heard 
that  China  is  on  the  map,  and  occupies  a  big 
portion  of  it.  You  know  that  she  has  a  ruler 
of  some  kind  in  place  of  the  old  empress  dow- 

3 


4  PEKING  DUST 

ager  who  died  a  few  years  ago.  Come  to 
think  of  it,  the  ruler  is  a  president,  and  China 
is  a  republic.  Vaguely  you  may  remember 
that  she  became  a  republic  about  five  years 
ago,  after  a  revolution.  Also,  in  the  same 
vague  way,  you  may  have  heard  that  the  coun- 
try is  old  and  rich  and  peaceful,  with  about 
four  hundred  million  inhabitants;  and  beyond 
that  you  do  not  go.  Sufficient.  I  '11  go  no 
further,  either. 

After  six  weeks  in  Japan,  we  set  out  for 
Peking,  going  by  way  of  Korea.  On  the  boat 
from  Kobe  to  Shimonoseki,  passing  through 
the  famous  Inland  Sea  of  Japan, — which,  by 
the  way,  reminds  one  of  the  eastern  shore  of 
Maryland, — we  met  a  young  Englishman  re- 
turning to  Shanghai.  We  three,  being  the 
only  first-class  passengers  on  the  boat,  natur- 
ally fell  into  conversation.  He  said  he  had 
been  in  the  East  for  ten  years,  engaged  in 
business  in  Shanghai,  so  we  at  once  dashed  into 
the  subject  of  Oriental  politics.  Being  quite 
ignorant  of  Eastern  affairs,  but  having  heard 
vaguely  of  certain  phases  of  them,  we  asked  if 


POOR  OLD  CHINA  5 

he  could  tell  us  the  meaning  of  "sphere  of  in- 
fluence." The  Orient  seems  full  of  spheres  of 
influence,  particularly  China. 

"How  do  the  European  nations  acquire 
these  'spheres  of  influence'  in  China?"  I  asked. 
"Do  they  ask  the  Chinese  Government  to  give 
them  to  them? — to  set  apart  certain  territory, 
certain  provinces,  and  give  them  commercial 
and  trading  rights  to  these  areas?" 

"Ask  the  Chinese  Government?"  repeated 
the  young  man,  scornfully.  "Ask  the 
Chinese?  I  should  say  not!  The  European 
powers  just  arrange  it  among  themselves,  each 
decides  what  provinces  it  wants,  agrees  not  to 
trespass  upon  the  spheres  of  influence  of  one 
another,  and  then  they  just  notify  China." 

"Just  notify  China?"  I  exclaimed.  "You 
mean  they  don't  consult  China  at  all  and  find 
out  whether  she  's  willing  or  not?  You  mean 
they  just  decide  the  matter  among  themselves, 
partition  out  the  country  as  they  like,  select 
such  territory  as  they  happen  to  fancy,  and 
then  just  notify  China?" 

"That's  the  idea,"  he  returned;  "virtually; 


6  PEKING  DUST 

that 's  all  there  is  to  it.  Choose  what  they 
want  and  then  just  notify  China." 

"Dear  me!"  said  I. 

I  'm  glad  we  met  that  young  man.  I  like 
things  put  simply,  in  words  of  one  syllable, 
within  range  of  the  understanding.  More- 
over, incredible  as  it  seems,  what  he  told  us  is 
true.  Oh,  of  course,  as  I  've  found  out  since, 
there  are  treaties  and  things  to  be  signed  after 
China  has  been  notified.  She  is  then  com- 
pelled to  ratify  these  treaties  or  agreements; 
it  looks  better.  Forced  to  sign  them  at  the 
pistol's  point,  as  it  were.  However,  this  rati- 
fication of  treaties  is  more  for  the  benefit  of 
the  European  powers  than  for  China.  Hav- 
ing staked  out  their  claims,  they  officially  re- 
cord them ;  that 's  all.  And  you  know  what 
used  to  happen  in  our  country  during  the  good 
old  days  of  the  "forty-niners"  if  some  one 
jumped  another's  claim. 

To  show  to  what  extent  poor  old  China  is 
under  the  "influence"  of  the  great  European 
powers,  I  shall  have  to  give  you  a  few  statis- 
tics ;  otherwise  you  won't  believe  me.  The  to- 


POOR  OLD  CHINA  7 

tal  area  of  the  Chinese  Republic  is  about 
4,300,000  square  miles.  The  spheres  of  influ- 
ence of  some  of  the  important  nations  are  as 
follows : 

Square  miles 

England:    Tibet     533,000 

Szechuen    218,000 

Kwan'tung    86,000 

Provinces  of  Yangtse  Valley 362,000 

Total    1,199,000  or  27.8% 

Russia:       Outer  Mongolia     1,000,000 

Che-Kiang     548,000 

Three-quarters  of  Manchuria  273,000 

Total     1,821,000  or  42.3% 

France:      Yunnan    146,700  or   3.4% 

Germany:  Shan-tung    55,000  or    1.3% 

Japan :        South   Manchuria    90,000 

Eastern  Inner  Mongolia 50,000 

Fu-kien    46,000 

Total     186,000  or    4.3% 

Total  area  under  foreign  influence  79% 

Don't  forget  these  figures;  turn  back  to  them 
from  time  to  time  to  refresh  your  memory. 
But  remember  one  thing:  it  is  not  customary 
to  speak  of  anything  but  of  Japanese  aggres- 
sion. Whenever  Japan  acquires  another 
square  mile  of  territory,  forestalling  some  one 
else,  the  fact  is  heralded  round  the  world,  and 
the  predatory  tendencies  of  Japan  are  de- 
nounced as  a  menace  to  the  world.  But  pub- 


8  PEKING  DUST 

licity  is  not  given  to  the  predatory  tendencies 
of  other  powers.  They  are  all  in  agreement 
with  one  another,  and  nothing  is  said;  a  con- 
spiracy of  silence  surrounds  their  actions,  and 
the  facts  are  smothered,  not  a  hint  of  them 
getting  abroad.  The  Western  nations  are  in 
accord,  and  the  Orient — China — belongs  to 
them.  But  with  Japan  it  is  different.  So  in 
future,  when  you  hear  that  Japan  has  her  eye 
on  China,  is  attempting  to  gobble  up  China, 
remember  that,  compared  with  Europe's  total, 
Japan's  holdings  are  very  small  indeed.  The 
loudest  outcries  against  Japanese  encroach- 
ments come  from  those  nations  that  possess  the 
widest  spheres  of  influence.  The  nation  that 
claims  forty-two  per  cent,  of  China,  and  the 
nation  that  claims  twenty-seven  per  cent,  of 
China  are  loudest  in  their  denunciations  of  the 
nation  that  possesses  (plus  the  former  German 
holdings)  less  than  six. 

Our  first  actual  contact  with  a  sphere  of  in- 
fluence at  work  came  about  in  this  wise: 
After  we  had  spent  two  or  three  weeks  in 
Korea,  we  took  the  train  from  Seoul  to  Peking, 


POOR  OLD  CHINA  9 

a  two-days'  journey.  In  these  exciting  days 
it  is  hard  to  do  without  newspapers,  and  at 
Mukden,  where  we  had  a  five-hours'  wait,  we 
came  across  a  funny  little  sheet  called  "The 
Manchuria  Daily  News."  It  was  a  nice  little 
paper;  that  is,  if  you  are  sufficiently  cosmo- 
politan to  be  emancipated  from  American 
standards.  It  was  ten  by  fifteen  inches  in 
size, — comfortable  to  hold,  at  any  rate, — with 
three  pages  of  news  and  advertisements,  and 
one  blank  page  for  which  nothing  was  forth- 
coming. Tucked  in  among  advertisements  of 
mineral  waters,  European  groceries,  foreign 
banking-houses,  and  railway  announcements 
was  an  item.  But  for  our  young  man  on  the 
boat,  I  should  n't  have  known  what  it  meant. 
We  read: 

ALLIES   PROTEST  TO   CHINA 

Great  Britain,  France  and  Russia  have  lodged 
their  respective  protests  with  China  on  the  ground 
that  the  Sino-American  railway  loan  agreement 
recently  concluded,  infringes  upon  their  acquired 
rights.  The  Russian  contention  is  that  the  con- 
struction of  the  railway  from  Fengchen  to  Ninghsia 


10  PEKING  DUST 

conflicts  with  the  1899  Russo-Chinese  Secret  Treaty. 
The  British  point  out  that  the  Hangchow-Wenchow 
railway  under  scheme  is  a  violation  of  the  Anglo- 
Chinese  Treaty  re  Hunan  and  Kwanghsi,  and  that 
the  proposed  railway  constitutes  a  trespass  on  the 
British  preferential  right  to  build  railways.  The 
French  Government,  on  behalf  of  Belgium,  argues 
that  the  Lanchow-Ninghsia  line  encroaches  upon  the 
Sino-Belgian  Treaty  re  the  Haichow-Lanchow  Rail- 
way, and  that  the  railway  connecting  Hangchow 
with  Nanning  intrudes  upon  the  French  sphere  of  in- 
fluence. 

There  you  have  it!  China  needing  a  rail- 
way, an  American  firm  willing  to  build  a 
railway,  and  Russia,  England,  France,  and 
even  poor  little  Belgium  blocking  the  scheme. 
All  of  them  busy  with  a  tremendous  war  on 
their  hands,  draining  all  their  resources  of  both 
time  and  money,  yet  able  to  keep  a  sharp  eye 
on  China  to  see  that  she  does  n't  get  any  im- 
provements that  are  not  of  their  making. 
And  after  the  war  is  over,  how  many  years  will 
it  be  before  they  are  sufficiently  recovered 
financially  to  undertake  such  an  expenditure? 
China  must  just  wait,  I  suppose. 


POOR  OLD  CHINA  11 

On  each  side  of  the  rocking  railway  carriage 
stretched  vast  arid  plains,  sprinkled  with  in- 
numerable villages  consisting  of  mud  houses. 
The  fields  were  cut  across  in  every  direction 
by  dirt  roads,  unpaved,  full  of  deep  ruts  and 
holes.  At  times  these  roads  were  sunk  far  be- 
low the  level  of  the  fields,  worn  deep  into  the 
earth  by  the  traffic  of  centuries;  so  deep  in 
places  that  the  tops  of  the  blue-hooded  carts 
were  also  below  the  level  of  the  fields.  Yet 
these  roads  afford  the  only  means  of  communi- 
cation with  the  immense  interior  provinces  of 
China — these  sunken  roads  and  the  rivers. 

Just  then  we  passed  a  procession  of  camels, 
and  for  a  moment  I  forgot  all  about  the  arti- 
cle in  "The  Manchuria  Daily  News."  Who 
would  n't,  seeing  camels  on  the  landscape !  A 
whole  long  caravan  of  them,  several  hundred, 
all  heavily  laden,  and  moving  in  slow,  majes- 
tic dignity  at  the  rate  of  two  miles  an  hour! 
Coming  in  from  some  unknown  region  of  the 
great  Mongolian  plains,  the  method  of  trans- 
portation employed  for  thousands  of  years! 
Yes,  undoubtedly,  China  needs  railways;  but 


12  PEKING  DUST 

she  can't  have  any  more  at  present,  for  she  has 
no  money  to  construct  them  herself,  and  the 
great  nations  who  claim  seventy-nine  per  cent, 
of  her  soil  have  n't  time  at  present  to  build 
them  for  her.  And  they  object  to  letting 
America  do  it.  A  sphere  of  influence  is  a  dog 
in  the  manger. 


II 

PEKING 

HERE  we  are  in  Peking  at  last,  the 
beautiful,  barbaric  capital  of  China, 
the  great,  gorgeous  capital  of  Asia.  For  Pek- 
ing is  the  capital  of  Asia,  of  the  whole  Orient, 
the  center  of  the  stormy  politics  of  the  Far 
East.  We  are  established  at  the  Grand 
Hotel  des  Wagons-Lits,  called  locally  the 
"Bed-Wagon  Hotel,"  or,  as  the  marines  say, 
the  "Wagon  Slits."  It  is  the  most  interesting 
hotel  in  the  world,  too,  where  the  nations  of  the 
world  meet,  rub  elbows,  consult  together,  and 
plan  to  "do"  one  another  and  China,  too.  It  is 
entertaining  to  sit  in  the  dark,  shabby  lounge 
and  watch  the  passers-by,  or  to  dine  in  the  big, 
shabby,  gilded  dining-room,  and  see  the  vari- 
ous types  gathered  there,  talking  together  over 
big  events,  or  over  little  events  that  have  big 

13 


14  PEKING  DUST 

consequences.  Peking  is  not  a  commercial 
city,  not  a  business  center;  it  is  not  filled  with 
drummers  or  traveling-men  or  small  fry  of 
that  kind,  such  as  you  find  in  Shanghai  and 
lesser  places.  It  is  the  diplomatic  and  po- 
litical center  of  the  Orient,  and  here  are  the 
people  who  are  at  the  top  of  things,  no  matter 
how  shady  the  things.  At  least  it  is  the  top 
man  in  the  concern  who  is  here  to  promote  its 
interests. 

Here  are  the  big  concession-hunters  of  all 
nationalities,  with  headquarters  in  the  hotel, 
ready  to  sit  tight  for  a  period  of  weeks  or 
months  or  as  long  as  it  may  take  to  wheedle  or 
bribe  or  threaten  the  Chinese  Government  into 
granting  them  what  they  wish — a  railroad,  a 
bank,  a  mine,  a  treaty  port.  Over  in  a  corner 
of  the  lounge  sits  a  so-called  princess,  a  Chinese 
lady,  very  modern,  very  chic,  very  European 
as  to  clothes,  who  was  formerly  one  of  the 
ladies-in-waiting  to  the  old  empress  dowager, 
And,  by  the  way,  it  took  a  woman  to  hold 
China  together.  Next  to  her  sits  a  young 
Chinese  gentleman,  said  to  be  the  grandson  of 


PEKING  15 

one  of  the  old  prime  ministers,  a  slim,  dapper 
youth,  spectacled  and  intelligent.  I  may  say 
that  the  lady  is  almost  completely  surrounded 
by  the  young  man,  but  no  one  gives  them  more 
than  a  passing  glance.  We  do,  because  we 
are  new-comers,  but  the  others  are  used  to  it. 
The  British  adviser  to  the  Chinese  Government 
passes,  a  tall,  distinguished,  gray-haired  man, 
talking  with  a  burly  Englishman,  hunter  of 
big  game,  but  now,  according  to  rumor,  a  mem- 
ber of  the  secret  service.  Concession-hunters 
and  business  men  sit  about  in  groups,  repre- 
sentatives of  great  commercial  and  banking 
firms  from  all  over  the  world.  A  minister 
from  some  legation  drops  in;  there  are  curio- 
buyers  from  Europe,  with  a  sprinkling  of 
tourists,  and  a  tired-looking,  sallow  group  of 
anemic  men  and  women  who  have  just  come 
up  from  Manila  on  an  army  transport. 

The  approach  to  Peking  is  tremendously 
impressive.  Lying  in  an  arid  plain,  the  great, 
gray  walls,  with  their  magnificent  towers,  rise 
dignified  and  majestic.  Over  the  tops  of  the 
walls  nothing  is  to  be  seen.  There  are  no  sky- 


16  PEKING  DUST 

scrapers  within;  no  house  is  higher  than  the 
surrounding,  defending  ramparts.  Peking  is 
divided  into  several  areas,  each  called  a  city, 
each  city  surrounded  by  its  own  walls.  There 
is  the  great,  populous  Chinese  City,  where 
only  the  Chinese  dwell.  The  Tartar,  or  Man- 
chu,  City  has  several  subdivisions.  It  contains 
the  legation  quarter,  and  all  the  foreign  lega- 
tions are  clustered  together  in  a  small,  com- 
pact area,  surrounded  by  a  small  wall  for  de- 
fensive purposes.  Beyond  the  legation  quar- 
ter, on  all  sides,  extends  the  Tartar  City  itself. 
Foreigners  also  live  in  this  part  of  Peking,  and, 
as  far  as  I  can  see,  always  hold  themselves  in 
readiness  to  dash  to  the  protection  of  their  le- 
gation if  anything  goes  wrong.  They  tell  one 
that  it  is  quite  safe,  that  nothing  can  go  wrong, 
that  the  Boxer  troubles  can  never  be  repeated ; 
but  all  the  same,  they  always  appear  to  have  a 
bag  packed  and  a  ladder  leaning  against  the 
compound  walls  in  case  of  emergency.  Which 
gives  life  in  Peking  a  delightful  flavor  of  sus- 
pense and  excitement. 

Also  within  the  Tartar  City  lies  the  Imperial 


PEKING  17, 

City,  inclosed  by  towering  red  walls,  and 
within  that  lies  the  Forbidden  City,  residence 
of  the  rulers  of  China,  containing  the  palaces, 
and  the  dwelling-places  of  the  mandarins. 
Now,  except  for  certain  parts  of  the  Forbid- 
den City,  such  as  the  palace  of  the  President, 
Li  Yuan  Hung,  the  city  is  no  longer  forbid- 
den. It  is  open  to  the  public,  and  the  public 
may  come  and  go  at  will;  coolies,  hucksters, 
beggars,  foreigners — all  may  move  freely 
within  the  sacred  precincts  where  formerly 
none  but  the  high  and  mighty  might  venture. 

The  streets  are  marvelous.  Those  in  the 
legation  quarter  are  well  paved,  European, 
and  stupid ;  but  those  in  the  Chinese  and  Tartar 
cities  are  full  of  excitement.  A  few  are  wide, 
but  the  majority  are  narrow,  winding  alleys, 
and  all  alike  are  packed  and  crowded  with  peo- 
ple and  animals  and  vehicles  of  all  kinds. 
Walking  is  a  matter  of  shoving  oneself  through 
the  throng,  dodging  under  camels'  noses, 
avoiding  wheelbarrows,  bumping  against  don- 
keys, standing  aside  to  let  officials'  carriages 
go  by, — antiquated  European  carriages,  very 


18  PEKING  DUST 

shabby  but  surrounded  by  outriders,  mounted 
on  shaggy  Mongolian  ponies,  who  gallop  ahead 
and  clear  the  way.  The  horses  can't  be  guided 
from  behind ;  the  coachman  sits  on  the  box  and 
holds  the  reins  and  looks  impressive,  but  the 
real  work  is  done  by  the  mafu  or  groom. 
When  it  comes  to  turning  a  corner,  passing  a 
camel-train,  or  other  obstacle,  the  mafu  is 
obliged  to  leap  down  from  his  seat,  seize  the 
bridle,  and  lead  the  horses  round  whatever  ob- 
struction there  may  be.  At  other  times,  when 
not  leading  the  horses,  the  mafu  sits  on  the  box 
and  shouts  to  clear  the  way.  I  tell  you,  prog- 
ress in  a  carriage  is  a  noisy  affair, — what  with 
the  rattling  of  the  old  vehicle,  the  clanking  of 
the  brass-mounted  harness,  the  yells  and 
screams  of  the  groom,  and  the  yells  and  shouts 
of  the  crowds  refusing  to  give  way.  It 's  bar- 
baric, but  has  a  certain  style  and  swing. 

Don't  think  there  is  any  speed  to  a  carriage. 
Oh,  no.  Despite  the  noise  and  rattle  and  ap- 
parent progress,  the  progress  itself  is  very 
slow.  At  the  rate  of  two  miles  an  hour,  pos- 
sibly. We  went  out  for  a  drive  in  the  min- 


PEKING  19 

ister's  carriage  the  other  day,  a  comfortable 
victoria,  drawn  by  a  pair  of  very  fat,  very  sor- 
rel horses,  and  we  skimmed  along,  as  I  say,  at 
the  rate  of  two  miles  an  hour  when  the  going 
was  good.  All  we  passed  were  the  pedestri- 
ans,— a  few  of  them, — and  we  usually  found 
ourselves  tailing  along  behind  a  camel-train 
or  waiting  for  a  wheelbarrow  to  get  out  of  the 
way.  In  the  side  streets,  or  hutungs,  we 
shouted  ourselves  along  at  a  snail's  pace,  cleav- 
ing the  dense  throngs  of  inattentive  citizens, 
whose  right  to  the  middle  of  the  road  was  as 
great  as  ours,  and  who  didn't  purpose  to  be 
disturbed.  Once  on  turning  a  corner,  the 
groom  pulled  the  bridle  off  one  of  the  horses. 
Off  it  slipped  into  his  hand,  and  the  horse 
tossed  his  head  and  ran.  The  mafu  yelled, 
the  coachman  yelled,  every  one  else  yelled,  and 
for  a  few  moments  there  was  intense  excite- 
ment. Later  on,  that  same  afternoon,  we  went 
out  to  tea  somewhere,  this  time  going  by  rick- 
shaw. In  comparison  to  the  speed  of  a  car- 
riage, the  pace  of  a  rickshaw-runner  is  prodi- 
gious. We  were  positively  dizzy. 


20  PEKING  DUST 

There  is  a  great  difference  between  the  speed 
of  the  rickshaw-runners  in  Tokyo  and  in  Pe- 
king. In  Japan  they  go  rather  slowly,  and  re- 
fuse to  overexert  themselves,  and  quite  right, 
too;  but  here  they  go  at  top  speed.  There 
are  such  enormous  numbers  of  them,  and  com- 
petition is  so  keen,  that  the  swift  young  runners 
make  capital  of  their  strength.  It  is  pathetic 
to  see  broken-down  old  coolies,  panting  and 
blowing,  making  painful  efforts  to  compete 
with  the  younger  men.  I  am  not  yet  used  to 
being  taken  about  by  man-power.  It  seems 
wrong  somehow,  demoralizing,  for  one  human 
being  to  place  himself  in  that  humiliating  rela- 
tion to  another,  to  become  a  draft  animal,  to  be 
forced  to  lower  himself  to  the  level  of  an  ox 
or  an  ass.  It  must  have  an  insidious,  demoral- 
izing effect,  too,  upon  the  persons  who  ride  in 
these  little  vehicles.  I  am  not  yet  used  to  see- 
ing able-bodied  young  foreigners,  especially 
men,  being  pulled  about  by  thin,  tired,  ex- 
hausted coolies.  I  feel  ashamed  every  time  I 
enter  a  rickshaw  and  contrast  my  well-being 
with  that  of  the  ragged  boy  between  the  shafts. 


Camel   caravan,   Peking 


PEKING  21 

I  suppose  I  shall  get  over  this  feeling,  think 
no  more  about  it  than  any  one  else  does,  but 
at  present  it  is  new  to  me.  Every  time  we 
leave  the  hotel,  twenty  boys  dash  forward,  all 
clamoring  for  us;  and  if  we  decide  to  walk, 
twenty  disappointed,  half -starved  boys  wheel 
their  little  buggies  back  to  the  curb  again 
and  wait.  Well,  what  can  one  do  ?  They  are 
so  desperately  poor !  One  way  or  the  other,  it 
seems  all  wrong. 

We  got  caught  in  a  block  in  the  Chinese  City 
the  other  day.  At  the  intersection  of  two 
cross  streets,  narrow  little  hutungs  about  eight 
feet  wide,  four  streams  of  traffic  collided,  and 
got  hopelessly  entangled  in  a  yelling,  unyield- 
ing snarl.  From  one  direction  came  a  camel- 
train  from  Mongolia;  from  another,  three  or 
four  blue-hooded,  long-axled,  Peking  carts. 
Along  a  third  street  came  a  group  of  water- 
carriers  and  wheelbarrows,  and  from  the  fourth 
half  a  dozen  rickshaws.  All  met,  and  in  a  mo- 
ment became  thoroughly  mixed  up.  There  be- 
ing no  traffic  regulation  of  any  kind,  no  right 
of  way  of  any  sort,  there  was  no  idea  in  the 


22  PEKING  DUST 

mind  of  any  one  but  that  of  his  unalterable 
right  to  go  ahead.  It  was  pandemonium  in  a 
minute,  with  yells  and  curses,  pushing  and 
blows,  men  whacking  one  another  and  the 
beasts  indiscriminately.  Over  the  tops  of  the 
blue-hooded  carts  the  tall  camels  raised  their 
scornful  heads,  and  surveyed  the  commotion 
with  aloof  disdain.  In  all  the  world  there  is 
nothing  so  arrogant  and  haughty  as  a  camel, 
and  they  regarded  from  their  supercilious 
height  the  petty  quarreling  of  man.  In  fifteen 
minutes,  however,  the  snarl  cleared  itself  up, 
and  it  was  the  camels  who  first  managed  to 
slither  by,  after  which  each  vehicle  unwound 
itself  from  the  mess  and  passed  on. 

You  know,  the  lobby  of  this  hotel  seems  a 
little  like  that  block  of  traffic.  There  is  such 
a  heterogeneous  massing  of  nationalities  and 
of  people  within  these  shabby  walls — officials, 
soldiers,  concession-hunters,  tourists,  attaches, 
journalists,  explorers.  All  those  camels,  cool- 
ies, rickshaw-boys,  and  water-carriers  each  felt 
that  he  had  the  right  of  way;  and  so  all  these 


PEKING  23 

people  think  that  they  have  the  right  of  way 
in  China.  There  must  be  a  hundred  different 
opinions  about  China  in  these  corridors  of  the 
hotel.  I  '11  see  what  I  can  discover. 


Ill 

CIVILIZATION 

THE  longer  we  stay  here,  the  more  we 
are  impressed  with  the  fact  that  in  China 
there  is  no  sympathy  for  the  Allies.  The  at- 
mosphere is  not  at  all  pro-German,  however. 
There  is  no  special  feeling  for  the  Central 
powers  any  more  than  there  is  for  the  Entente 
Allies.  It  can  best  be  described  as  neutrality, 
or,  rather,  complete  indifference  as  to  which 
group  wins.  Coming  as  we  have  direct  from 
France, — two  years  of  France  in  war-time,— 
it  is  very  curious  to  find  ourselves  plunged  into 
this  atmosphere  of  total  indifference  to  the 
outcome  and  objects  of  the  war.  We  have 
gathered  these  impressions  from  many  talks 
with  the  Chinese  and  from  a  diligent  perusal 
of  Chinese  papers, — papers  printed  in  Eng- 
lish, but  owned  and  edited  by  the  Chinese,  and 

24 


CIVIMZATON  25 

which  may  therefore  be  said  to  reflect  their 
sentiments.  Also  we  have  talked  with  many 
foreigners  who  have  lived  in  China  for  a  long 
time,  who  have  many  Chinese  friends  and  ac- 
quaintances, and  understand  the  Chinese  point 
of  view,  and  these  also  tell  us  that  China  has 
no  sympathy  with  the  Allies  or  with  any  other 
powers. 

The  explanation  is  not  hard  to  find.  De- 
spite what  foreigners  may  think  of  them,  the 
Chinese  are  by  no  means  fools.  They  possess 
the  wisdom  of  the  ages, — of  their  own  peculiar 
kind.  They  have  had  a  long  experience  with 
foreigners,  saddening  and  enriching,  and 
cynicism  is  the  outgrowth  of  such  experience. 
China  has  suffered  at  the  hands  of  the  great 
powers,  has  suffered  at  the  hands  of  England, 
Russia,  France,  and  Germany  alike.  She  is 
virtually  in  the  position  of  a  vassal  state,  not 
to  any  one  of  these  nations  but  to  all  of  them, 
and  they  have  pillaged  and  despoiled  her  for 
a  century  and  a  half.  To  one  of  them  she 
owes  the  curse  of  opium,  which  was  forced  upon 
her  for  commercial  reasons — a  curse  which  she 


26  PEKING  DUST 

is  about  ready  to  throw  off.  She  is  weak  and 
corrupt,  but  it  is  to  the  advantage  of  her  for- 
eign masters  to  keep  her  in  a  state  of  weak- 
ness and  corruption.  At  the  present  moment 
she  is  paying  huge  indemnities  to  various  Eu- 
ropean powers  as  compensation  for  the  losses 
they  sustained  during  the  Boxer  uprising  in 
1900,  the  Boxer  trouble  being  an  attempt  on 
the  part  of  China  to  rid  herself  of  the  foreign 
invader.  To  one  of  these  countries,  Russia, 
she  is  paying  an  indemnity  part  of  which  con- 
sists of  the  expenses  of  thousands  of  troops 
which  had  no  existence  except  on  paper.  It 
is  hardly  possible  for  the  Chinese  to  believe,  in 
the  light  of  their  own  experience,  that  the 
various  European  nations  at  death-grips  in 
this  war  are  actuated  by  the  noble  sentiments 
they  profess  to  be  fighting  for.  The  assur- 
ances from  Europe,  cabled  daily  to  the  Chi- 
nese press,  that  the  Allies  are  fighting  for 
liberty,  for  justice,  for  civilization,  for  the  pro- 
tection of  small  nations,  mean  nothing  to  the 
Chinese.  Such  professions  leave  them  cold. 
To  the  Oriental  mind  this  gigantic  struggle 


CIVILIZATON  27 

is  Jbetween  a  nation  who  is  mistress  of  the  world 
(and  the  world's  markets)  and  a  nation  who 
wishes  to  become  mistress  of  the  world  ( and  the 
world's  markets).  With  seventy -nine  per 
cent,  of  her  territory  under  foreign  control, 
China  can  hardly  believe  in  the  disinterested 
motives  of  the  fighting  nations. 

The  other  day  I  saw  a  little  incident  on 
the  street  that  puts  the  case  in  a  nutshell. 
Two  big  Mongolian  dogs  were  locked  together 
in  a  fight  to  the  death.  Each  had  the  other 
in  a  death-grip,  and  they  rolled  over  and  over 
in  the  dust,  surrounded  by  a  great  crowd  of 
people  who  stood  by  indifferently  and  watched 
them  fight  it  out.  This  is  the  attitude  of  China 
toward  the  European  War,  the  attitude  of 
the  calm,  indifferent  spectator. 

The  structure  of  civilization  that  Europe 
has  erected  for  itself  is  imposing  and  beau- 
tiful. We  in  America  are  confronted  with 
the  fa9ade  of  this  great  building,  and  beheld 
from  our  side  of  the  Atlantic  it  looks  magnifi- 
cent and  superb.  Even  when  we  enter  it  in 
Europe,  and  behold  its  many  ramifications, 


28  PEKING  DUST 

we  still  have  cause  to  admire.  But  there  is  a 
back  side  to  this  structure  of  civilization ;  there 
are  outbuildings,  slums,  and  alleys  not  visible 
from  the  front.  These  back  on  the  Orient, 
and  the  rear  view  of  the  structure  of  European 
civilization,  seen  from  the  Orient,  is  not  impos- 
ing at  all.  The  sweepings  and  refuse  of  West- 
ern civilization  and  Western  morality  are 
dumped  out  upon  the  Orient,  where  they  do 
not  show. 


IV 

EACE  ANTAGONISMS 

IT  is  a  crisp,  cold  morning,  but  nothing  to 
what  it  will  be,  they  tell  us,  when  the 
autumn  is  over,  and  the  bitter  winter  settles 
down  upon  North  China.  After  all,  come  to 
think  of  it,  we  are  abutting  on  two  extremely 
Northern  provinces,  Manchuria  and  Mongolia, 
and  these  adjoin  Siberia,  which  all  the  world 
knows  is  cold.  So  this  sharp  October  day, 
with  its  brilliant  blue  sky  and  hard,  glittering 
sunshine,  is  only  a  foretaste  of  the  weather 
that  will  come  later. 

To-day  we  went  into  the  Chinese  City  and 
visited  a  native  department  store.  At  the 
best  speed  of  our  rickshaw-boys  we  passed  out 
of  the  Chi'en  Men,  the  principal  gate,  and  once 
beyond  the  towering,  embattled  wall  that  sepa- 
rates the  Chinese  from  the  Tartar  City,  we  lost 
ourselves  in  the  maze  of  narrow,  winding 

29 


30  PEKING  DUST 

streets  that  open  on  all  sides  from  the  main 
road  leading  from  the  Chi'en  Men,  which,  by 
the  way,  has  been  in  the  possession  of  the 
American  troops  since  the  Boxer  uprising.  In 
the  narrow  hutungs  our  progress  was  slow; 
we  literally  shoved  our  way  through  crowds 
of  rickshaws  and  thousands  of  pedestrians,  and 
as  there  are  no  sidewalks,  we  were  alternately 
scraping  the  walls  and  shop  fronts  on  one 
hand,  or  locking  wheels  with  Peking  carts  on 
the  other,  and  feeling  the  warm  breath  of  a 
camel  or  donkey  down  our  necks  whenever  the 
traffic  brought  us  to  a  halt.  Finally  our  boys 
stopped  before  a  large  building  about  three 
stories  high,  emblazoned  with  gold  dragons, 
and  with  gorgeous  red  and  yellow  banners  and 
flags  all  over  the  front  of  it.  It  stood  some 
distance  back  from  the  street,  and  the  wide 
courtyard  in  front  was  filled  and  crowded  with 
the  carts  and  carriages  of  the  high-class  women 
who  had  gone  inside  to  shop. 

I  have  already  told  you  that  Chinese  horses 
can't  be  driven;  they  must  be  led  along  with 
great  show  and  shouting.  Well,  when  they 


RACE  ANTAGONISMS  31 

stop  they  can't  even  be  trusted  to  stay  in 
harness;  they  must  be  unharnessed  and  re- 
moved to  a  place  of  safety.  Therefore  the 
courtyard  of  this  department  store  presented 
a  unique  appearance,  filled  with  twenty  or 
thirty  Peking  carts,  empty,  tilted  back  on  their 
haunches,  with  shafts  gaping  toward  heaven. 
Also,  the  horses  had  been  removed  from  in- 
numerable little  coupes  of  ancient  date,  with 
the  superstructure  all  of  glass,  so  that  the  occu- 
pant within  is  completely  visible  from  all  sides, 
like  a  fish  in  an  aquarium.  Horses  and  mules, 
in  gorgeous,  glittering  harness,  were  carefully 
stood  apart,  or  were  being  led  up  and  down 
in  the  crowded  courtyard  to  cool  off.  Though 
why  cool  off,  after  a  dash  through  the  streets 
at  two  miles  an  hour  or  less,  I  could  n't  see. 
However,  here  they  all  were, — great,  high 
white  horses,  shaggy  Mongolian  ponies,  and 
magnificent  mules,  the  latter  by  far  the  most 
superb  animals  I  've  ever  seen.  I  am  not  much 
at  heights,  but  the  mules  were  enormously  tall, 
enormously  heavy,  very  beautiful  beasts,  white, 
red,  yellow,  and  black,  and  sleek  with  un- 


32  PEKING  DUST 

limited  polishing  and  grooming.  They  were 
clad — that 's  the  only  word — in  heavy,  barbaric 
harness,  mounted  with  huge  brass  buckles,  and 
in  some  cases  the  leather  was  studded  with 
jade,  carnelian,  and  other  semi-precious  stones. 
Style?  There  's  nothing  on  Fifth  Avenue 
to  touch  it.  Do  you  think  a  ten-thousand- 
dollar  automobile  is  handsome?  It's  nothing 
to  a  Peking  cart,  with  its  huge,  sleek  mule  and 
glittering  harness.  I  tell  you,  the  Chinese 
have  the  style  of  the  world;  the  rest  of  us  are 
but  imitators.  In  comparison,  our  motors  are 
merest  upstarts.  But  you  must  picture  a  Pe- 
king cart,  of  beautifully  polished  wood,  nat- 
ural color,  and  a  heavy  wooden  body  covered 
with  a  big  blue  hood.  The  owner  rides  in- 
side, on  cushions,  and  on  each  shaft  sits  a 
servant,  one  to  hold  the  reins,  the  other  to  yell 
and  jump  off  and  run  forward  to  press  his 
weight  on  the  shaft  to  lessen  the  jar  to  the 
occupant  whenever  a  bad  bit  of  road  presents 
itself.  They  say  that  this  old  custom,  due  to 
the  discomfort  and  jolting  of  the  springless 
carts,  is  the  reason  why  the  horses  are  not 


RACE  ANTAGONISMS  33 

trained  to  round  corners  or  go  over  bad  bits  of 
road  alone.  From  time  immemorial  it  has 
been  the  duty  of  the  groom  to  run  forward 
and  throw  his  weight  on  the  shafts  to  lessen 
the  jolts;  therefore  he  is  the  real,  the  important 
driver.  In  front  of  the  blue-linen  hood  hangs 
a  curtain,  and  the  two  side  windows  are  also 
carefully  curtained,  with  screens  which  per- 
mit the  occupant  to  see  out  but  not  to  be  seen 
from  without.  Thus  do  high-class  mandarins 
protect  themselves,  save  themselves  from  hav- 
ing to  descend  whenever  they  meet  a  mandarin 
of  equal  or  higher  rank  and  prostrate  them- 
selves in  the  dust  before  him.  Also,  the  longer 
the  axle,  the  further  it  projects  beyond  the 
hub  of  the  wheel,  the  higher  the  rank  of  the 
owner ;  it  denotes  his  right  to  occupy  the  road. 
The  rims  of  the  wheels  are  spiked:  big  nails 
project  all  round,  indicating  the  mandarin's 
right  to  tear  up  the  road.  It 's  all  splendid 
and  barbaric;  no  mawkish  sentiment  about  it. 
So  we  entered  the  department  store  through 
rows  and  rows,  very  neat  and  orderly,  of  up- 
turned carts  and  antiquated  coupes,  and  mules 


34.  PEKING  DUST 

and  horses  and  a  courtyard  full  of  liveried 
servants.  Inside,  it  still  looked  barbaric,  with 
its  magnificent  display  of  rich  silks  and  furs. 
Great  skins  of  tiger,  panther,  leopard,  wildcat, 
sable,  were  hanging  in  profusion  on  all  sides,  in- 
terspersed with  costly  embroideries,  wonderful 
brocades,  and  all  the  magnificence  and  color 
of  the  gorgeous  East.  It  was  the  idea  of 
iKwong,  our  pet  rickshaw-boy,  to  bring  us  here 
and  we  soon  found  that  foreigners  were  not 
expected  and  not  wanted.  No  one  of  the 
suave  shop  attendants  could  speak  English, 
nor  did  they  make  the  slightest  attempt  to  wait 
on  us.  We  wandered  round,  rather  desolate, 
followed  by  looks  of  curiosity  and  disdain  on 
the  part  of  the  clerks,  and  the  wholly  undis- 
guised amusement  and  contempt  of  the  high- 
class  Chinese  and  Manchu  women,  who,  with 
their  liveried  servants,  were  making  the  rounds 
of  the  various  floors.  In  the  store  it  was  noisy 
and  cheerful,  the  atmosphere  cold  and  close 
except  in  the  neighborhood  of  a  few  big  red- 
hot  stoves,  which  gave  forth  a  local  heat.  Chi- 
nese women,  not  high-class,  attired  in  satin 


RACE  ANTAGONISMS  35 

trousers,  sat  about  at  small  tables  drinking 
tea  and  smoking  cigarettes,  tea  and  cigarettes 
being  furnished  free  at  innumerable  little  tables 
on  every  floor.  As  we  passed,  they  giggled 
and  nudged  one  another.  Can't  you  imagine 
a  Chinese  lady  in  satin  trousers  passing 
through  a  great  American  department  store 
and  being  remarked  upon?  To  them  we  were 
equally  queer,  and  they  made  no  attempt  to 
disguise  the  fact.  There  was  none  of  that 
servile  deference  one  finds  among  the  hotel 
servants  and  the  rickshaw-boys,  or  of  the  ex- 
treme politeness  of  the  upper-class  Chinese 
whom  we  had  met  at  the  legations  and  else- 
where. To  these  people  we  were  nothing  but 
foreigners,  and  down  at  heart  foreigners  ex- 
cite nothing  but  amusement  or  hostility.  That 
conservative,  gossiping  throng  of  Orientals  had 
a  good,  firm  opinion  of  us,  and  it  was  n't  com- 
plimentary. We  were  interlopers  and  in- 
truders, and  had  no  business  in  that  pukkah 
Chinese  shop.  We  were  glad  to  get  out  and 
to  make  our  purchases  in  some  kindlier  atmos- 
phere. 


36  PEKING  DUST 

How  can  I  reconcile  this  impression  with 
previous  ones,  of  the  docility  and  servility  we 
had  previously  encountered?  Docility  and 
subserviency  are  necessary  in  dealing  with  the 
conquering  foreigner,  but  in  such  places  and 
on  such  occasions  when  those  qualities  are  not 
required,  we  get  an  impression  of  the  real  feel- 
ings of  the  Chinese.  I  believe  they  feel  to- 
ward us  very  much  as  we  should  feel  toward 
them,  or  toward  any  other  nation  that  claimed 
us  as  a  vassal  state.  For  one  country  to  be 
under  the  "influence"  of  another,  for  any  na- 
tion to  assert  a  "benevolent  protectorate"  over 
another,  is  to  engender  the  hostility  of  the  state 
so  patronized.  Very  well,  it  stands  to  rea- 
son. Foreigners  have  been  patting  China  on 
the  head  for  a  long  time,  and  repeated  pats 
don't  always  produce  a  callous ;  sometimes  they 
produce  profound  irritation. 

This  country  is  so  enormous,  so  chaotic,  one 
is  so  aware  of  the  strength  underlying  its  calm, 
submissive  exterior,  that  one  feels  that  some 
day  this  latent  strength  will  break  through  and 
disclose  itself.  In  trying  to  describe  all  these 


RACE  ANTAGONISMS          37 

feelings  at  random,  day  by  day  as  they  come, 
I  am  not  trying  to  sort  them  out  and  classify 
them  and  present  them  in  an  orderly  manner. 
You  must  see  them  with  me,  and  feel  them  with 
me  from  day  to  day,  and  do  your  own  thinking 
later.  That  English  boy  on  the  boat  coming 
over  to  China  told  us  this.  We  asked  him 
if  he  had  enjoyed  his  vacation  in  Japan. 

"Not  much,  he  replied.  "I  don't  care  for 
the  Japanese;  they  don't  compare  with  the 
Chinese." 

"What's  the  difference?"  I  asked. 

He  pondered  a  moment. 

"I  '11  sum  it  up  for  you  like  this,"  he  an- 
swered. "In  Japan  they  treat  you  as  an 
equal;  in  China  they  treat  you  as  a  superior." 

That 's  it,  I  believe.  Race  antagonism  all 
the  way  through.  China  is  a  conquered  coun- 
try. She  does  n't  dare  show  resentment  or 
insist  upon  equality.  Whatever  her  private 
opinion  may  be,  she  is  helpless,  and  she  must 
treat  her  conquerors  with  deference  as  superi- 
ors. But  Japan  has  never  been  conquered  by 
the  foreigner.  She  is  the  only  nation  among 


38  PEKING  DUST 

all  the  nations  of  the  Orient  that  has  never  been 
trodden  underfoot  by  the  European.  She  has 
never  been  subjugated  and  never  been 
drugged.  And,  curious  coincidence,  she  has 
reached  a  level  with  the  foremost  powers  of 
the  world,  and  holds  the  rank  of  a  first-class 
nation.  All  this  without  having  had  the 
blessings  of  European  civilization  conferred 
upon  her  by  a  conqueror!  She  has  snatched 
here  and  there,  has  imitated,  even  excelled,  cer- 
tain qualities  and  propensities  of  the  white 
man,  but  has  never  been  blighted  by  having 
Western  civilization  forced  upon  her.  That 's 
the  rub.  Japan  is  a  striking  example  to  the 
rest  of  Asia;  her  success  is  a  striking  com- 
mentary on  the  value  of  independence.  She 
has  attained  eminence  without  the  assistance  of 
the  great  powers.  And  of  the  value  of  this 
assistance,  conferred  by  the  great  powers  upon 
the  other  nations  of  Asia — enough  said. 


V 

SPHERES  OF  INFLUENCE 

WE  are  beginning  to  know  a  lot  of  peo- 
ple in  Peking,  for  we  were  launched 
upon  Peking  society  the  other  night  when  we 
dined  at  the  American  legation.  It  was  the 
first  dinner  party  we  have  been  to  in  several 
years,  as  we  have  been  living  quietly  in  Paris 
since  the  beginning  of  the  war,  and  there  are 
no  such  things  as  dinners  or  parties  in  Paris 
in  these  distressful  days.  However,  knowing 
that  we  were  coming  to  the  Orient,  and  having 
shrewd  ideas  that  possibly  we  might  be  in- 
vited out,  and  therefore  would  need  a  proper 

dress,  E and  I  each  had  one  made,  a 

good  one.  Strange  and  unusual  sensation  to 
get  into  them ;  neither  of  us  could  tell  the  back 
from  the  front!  They  looked  alike  from  both 
aspects,  and  felt  equally  uncomfortable  either 

39 


40  PEKING  DUST 

way.  We  tried  them  on  both  ways  and  got 
no  light  from  the  experience,  and  then  laid 
them  on  the  bed  and  looked  at  them  rumina- 
tively,  all  the  while  the  clock  moving  toward 
eight  and  no  decision  reached. 

Finally,  we  concluded  that  if  there  was  as  lit- 
tle difference  between  back  and  front  as  that,  it 
could  n't  matter  much.  Which  shows  you  how 
little  we  have  been  wearing  evening  clothes  in 
the  last  two  years,  and  how  unaccustomed  to 
them  we  are.  So,  as  I  say,  we  dined  at  the 
legation  the  other  night,  with  our  dresses  on 
hind-side  before,  for  all  we  knew,  and  neither  of 
us  was  troubled  at  all.  Had  a  delightful  time, 
too,  and  met  many  interesting  people.  The 
dinner  was  in  honor  of  the  general  in  charge  of 
our  army  in  the  Philippines,  and  we  also  met 
Admiral  von  Hinze,  the  German  minister. 
The  Dutch  minister  and  his  wife  were  there, 
too.  As  America  is  neutral,  it  is  necessary  to 
entertain  the  various  diplomats  as  usual,  but 
naturally  they  can't  all  dine  at  the  legation  on 
the  same  evening.  Sheep  and  goats,  as  it  were, 
one  dinner  to  the  Allied  representatives,  the 


SPHERES  OF  INFLUENCE      41 

next  to  the  representatives  of  the  Central  pow- 
ers. Much  nice  sorting  is  required,  and  they 
tell  us  that  in  consequence  of  the  war  Peking 
society  is  rift  in  twain.  This  is  all  very  well 
when  it  happens  in  a  big  community,  but  when 
it  happens  in  such  a  limited  little  society  as 
Peking,  all  walled  in  together  within  the  nar- 
row inclosure  of  the  legation  quarter, — walled 
in  literally,  also,  in  the  fullest  sense,  with  sol- 
diers from  the  guards  of  the  various  legations 
patrolling  the  walls  and  mounting  guard  day 
and  night, — such  a  situation  results  in  great 
tension  and  embarrassment  all  round.  There 
was  not  one  word  of  war  talk  during  the  din- 
ner; it  was  tacitly  avoided,  by  common  con- 
sent. 

Well,  as  I  said,  after  that  dinner  the  other 
night,  people  began  to  be  very  nice  to  us  and 
to  invite  us  out.  The  one  safe  subject  for 
discussion  is  Chinese  politics,  in  which  every 
one  is  interested  and  of  which  every  one  knows 
a  lot.  At  least,  I  don't  know  that  they  really 
know,  but  they  say  they  do,  and  speak  as  if  they 
do,  and  become  emphatic  if  you  doubt  them, 


42  PEKING  DUST 

and  altogether  they  dispense  a  wonderful  lot 
of  news,  whatever  its  value.  Rumors !  There 
was  never  in  the  world  such  a  place  for  rumors 
as  Peking.  We  thought  Paris  was  the  hotbed 
of  rumors  during  the  last  two  years  of  the 
war — Paris  with  its  censored  press,  suppressed 
speech,  and  general  military  rule,  so  that  all 
one  lives  on  are  the  rumors  that  never  get  into 
the  papers;  but  Peking  is  stupendous.  Here 
the  rumors  simply  fly,  and  the  corridors  of  the 
old  Wagons-Lits  Hotel  seems  to  be  the  pivotal 
spot  of  the  whirlwind.  Sooner  or  later  every 
one  in  Peking  seems  to  drop  into  the  hotel  on 
some  pretext  or  other,  as  if  it  were  a  club,  and 
the  lounge  is  so  thick  with  news  and  rumor  and 
gossip  that  you  can  lean  up  against  them  and 
not  fall  down.  All  absolutely  true,  authentic, 
unquestionable,  and  to-morrow  all  flatly  con- 
tradicted by  another  set  equally  veracious, 
startling,  and  imposing.  Never  mind.  Who 
are  we,  to  question  the  truth  of  them?  All  we 
can  do  is  to  drink  them  in  day  by  day,  modify 
and  change  our  opinions  on  the  morrow,  and 


SPHERES  OF  INFLUENCE      43 

enjoy  ourselves  with  such  thrills  as  one  gets 
nowhere  else  in  the  civilized  world. 

On  top  of  it  all  we  have  the  newspapers. 
There  are  three  or  four  in  English,  one  in 
French,  and  the  rest  in  the  vernacular.  The 
most  interesting  is  "The  Peking  Gazette," 
since  it  represents  the  pure  Chinese  point  of 
view.  Printed  in  English,  it  is  owned  and 
edited  by  the  Chinese,  and  gives  their  side  of 
the  story.  The  editor  is  a  delightful  man,  Chi- 
nese, an  Oxford  graduate,  fiery,  intense,  alert, 
ever  on  the  defensive  for  China's  rights  and 
speaking  in  no  uncertain  tones  on  that  sub- 
ject, leaving  one  in  no  doubt  as  to  his  attitude 
on  a  decision  concerning  China's  welfare  when 
opposed  to  the  welfare  of  a  European  nation 
that  wishes  to  "do"  China.  "The  Daily  News" 
is  the  organ  of  the  Allied  powers,  and  pre- 
sents things  from  the  point  of  view  of  the 
Western  nations;  consequently  there  is  per- 
petual warfare  between  the  "Gazette"  and  the 
"News,"  the  perpetual  clash  between  Chinese 
and  foreign  interests.  Only  on  one  subject 


44  PEKING  DUST 

do  they  agree — their  hatred  of  Japan.  For 
the  Chinese  do  not  like  Japan  any  more  than 
they  like  any  other  would-be  conqueror.  And 
the  Europeans  do  not  like  Japan,  who  is  their 
great  commercial  rival,  a  rival  that  can  market 
her  products  without  going  half-way  round 
the  world.  Consequently  the  "News"  attacks 
Japan,  while  the  "Gazette"  attacks  impartially 
all  invaders  who  seek  the  subjection  of  China. 
It  is  amusing.  When  the  "Gazette"  attacks 
Japan,  a  chorus  of  praise  from  the  European 
organs.  When  it  attacks  predatory  tenden- 
cies manifested  by  European  nations,  a  chorus 
of  denunciation  from  the  European  organs. 
But  the  editor  fights  ahead,  regardless  of 
praise  or  blame,  with  a  single  purpose  in  view, 
the  preservation  of  China's  sovereignty. 

A  few  days  ago  this  article  appeared  in  the 
"Gazette,"  an  amplification  of  the  little  para- 
graph in  that  diminutive  newspaper  "The 
Manchuria  Daily  News"  of  which  I  wrote  you. 
Said  the  "Gazette,"  under  a  bold  head-line  in 
large  type : 


CHINA  IN   FETTERS 

Foreign  writers  are  wont  to  complain  that  nothing 
in  the  sense  of  real  work  is  being  done  in  this  coun- 
try.    This,  of  course,  is  a  misleading  statement,  al- 
though much  that  ought  to  be  done  is  left  undone. 
And  one  of  the  principal  reasons  for  this  state  of 
things  is  revealed  in  what  begins  to  look  like  the  de- 
velopment of  a  scandalous  opposition  to  American 
enterprise  in  China.     Owing  to  the  war  putting  a 
stop  to  the  financing  of  public  undertakings  in  China 
by  European  capitalists  and  contractors,  a  power- 
ful American  organization  has  turned  its  attention 
to  this  country  and  in  an  entirely  business  sense  has 
secured   contracts   for   the   construction   of   certain 
railroads  in   China.     The   transaction   involves   the 
expenditure  of  $200,000,000  of  American  money,  a 
considerable  portion  of  which  will  be  spent  for  labor 
and  other  things.     It  is  admitted  that  there  is  abso- 
lutely nothing  like  "politics"  in  the  deal.     The  same 
remark  applies  with  greater  force  to  the  American 
loan  for  the  conservency  of  a  portion  of  the  Grand 
Canal.     And  yet  we  have  Japan,  Russia,  Franco, 
Great  Britain,  and  even  Belgium — a  country  that 
ought  at  least  to  know  what  not  to  do  to  a  state 
struggling  to  preserve  its  elementary  rights  of  exist- 
ence— trying  to  interfere  with  the  construction  of 
necessary  public  works  in  this  country,  simply  be- 
cause America  can  do  what  these  other  people  cannot 
now  do. 


46  PEKING  DUST 

"China  in  Fetters" — a  significant  term  for 
a  Chinese  newspaper  to  use.  It  would  seem 
as  if  these  spheres  of  influence  *  had  become 
linked  together  into  a  chain  for  throttling  pur- 
poses. I  tried  to  tell  you  the  other  day  about 
them,  but  please  listen  to  a  little  further  ex- 
planation. In  the  lobby  of  the  hotel  I  found 
a  journalist  who  knows  things,  who  had  been 
in  China  many  years. 

"Explain  to  me,"  I  asked  him,  "all  over, 
from  the  very  beginning,  what  these  things 
mean." 

"The  country  which  claims  such  a  sphere," 
he  began  patiently,  "claims  for  itself  the  right 
to  develop  that  territory." 

"Suppose,"  I  interrupted,  "the  Chinese 
themselves  should  wish  to  develop  this  ter- 
ritory,— to  open  up  a  gold-mine,  to  build  a 
railway, — would  they  be  allowed  to  do  so?" 

"Certainly,  if  they  have  the  money." 

"But  if  they  haven't  the  money,  if  they 
must  borrow?" 

i  America  has  neither  a  concession  nor  a  sphere  of  influ- 
ence in  all  China. 


SPHERES  OF  INFLUENCE      47 

"Then  they  must  borrow  from  the  power 
which  claims  the  territory." 

"But  if  for  some  reason  that  power  can't 
lend  it  to  them, — can't  spare  it,  as  is  the  case 
with  all  Europe  at  present, — or  if  for  some 
other  reason  does  not  wish  to  lend  it,  what 
then?" 

He  shrugged  his  shoulders. 

"Fineesh !  China  can't  borrow  money  from 
one  power  to  'start  something'  in  the  sphere 
of  influence  claimed  by  another." 

Apropos  of  all  this  there  's  a  good  story  at 
present  going  the  rounds  of  Peking.  The 
head  of  a  certain  great  corporation,  out  here 
seeking  a  concession  from  the  Chinese  Gov- 
ernment, appeared  before  the  Chinese  offi- 
cials one  day  and  made  his  request.  The  offi- 
cials, in  their  gorgeous  robes,  were  all  seated 
round  a  large  table  on  which  was  spread  a 
map  of  China.  It  was  a  wonderful  large  map, 
but  all  colored  in  different  colors,  some  parts 
red,  some  blue,  others  yellow,  and  so  on.  Be- 
hind the  chairs  of  the  Chinese  officials  stood  the 
representatives  of  the  various  European  pow- 


48  PEKING  DUST 

ers — British,  French,  Russian,  all  of  them. 
Our  American  laid  his  finger  on  that  part  of 
the  map  colored  red. 

"I  '11  do  the  work  here,"  he  said  to  the  Chi- 
nese. 

"Excuse  me,"  interrupted  a  representative 
of  a  foreign  government,  "you  can't  go  there. 
That  red  part  of  China  belongs  to  Great 
Britain." 

"Very  well.  I  '11  go  here,"  said  the  Ameri- 
can, indicating  the  blue  part  of  the  map. 

"Excuse  me,"  said  another  European  gentle- 
man, "you  can't  do  it  there.  That  part  of 
China  belongs  to  Russia." 

"Here,  then,"  continued  the  American,  lay 
ing  his  finger  on  a  green  spot.     "This  will 
do." 

Another  suave  alert  diplomatic  gentleman 
stepped  forth. 

"That,"  he  said  regretfully,  "is  French." 

So  it  went  on  all  over  the  map.  The  Chi- 
nese officials  sat  silent,  while  one  European 
representative  after  another  stepped  forward 


SPHERES  OF  INFLUENCE      49 

with  his  objections.  Finally,  in  exasperation, 
the  American  turned  to  the  silent  Chinese  and 
asked : 

"Where  the  hell  is  China?" 


VI 

ON   THE   SACREDNESS   OF  FOREIGNERS 

YOU  know,  I  can't  believe  that  it  is  good 
for  us, — Americans,  Europeans,  for- 
eigners of  all  sorts, — to  feel  ourselves  so  sacred 
as  we  feel  in  China.  Whatever  we  do,  we  are 
always  right,  no  matter  how  wrong  we  may  be. 
We  always  have  the  right  of  way,  the  privi- 
lege of  walking  over  the  Chinese,  and  to  this 
privilege  they  must  submit.  Our  sacredness 
is  not  due  to  admiration  for  or  belief  in  us. 
Quite  the  contrary.  It  is  due  to  a  deep  sense 
of  fear  of  the  consequences  should  they  attempt 
to  check  or  curb  our  activities  or  inclinations. 
The  relations  between  a  subject  people  and 
their  conquerors  is  fundamentally  immoral, 
and  demoralizing  to  both.  A  few  years  ago 
motors  made  their  appearance  in  Peking ;  there 
are  not  many  even  to-day.  But  there  are  no 

50 


FOREIGNERS  51 

speed  regulations,  and  they  dash  through  the 
crowded  streets  as  rapidly  as  they  choose. 
After  a  number  of  accidents  the  Chinese  sought 
to  establish  a  speed-limit  law,  but  this  was  posi- 
tively objected  to  by  one  of  the  foreign  min- 
isters, who  said  that  he  did  not  intend  to  have 
his  liberty  interfered  with  by  the  Chinese! 

Throughout  China  are  the  foreign  conces- 
sions, small  holdings  of  land  which  belong  to 
the  various  European  nations.  In  each  of  the 
treaty  ports  these  concessions  are  established, 
— Russian,  English,  French,  German, — and 
although  they  lie  in  the  heart  of  a  Chinese  city, 
they  are  absolutely  the  property  of  the  Rus- 
sians, English,  French,  or  Germans,  as  the 
case  may  be.  The  Chinese  have  no  authority 
or  control  over  them,  and  are  unable  to  regu- 
late them  in  any  way.  This  brings  about  a 
very  difficult  situation  for  the  Chinese.  For 
example,  the  opium  traffic.  On  Chinese  soil 
the  sale  of  opium  is  strictly  prohibited;  yet  it 
is  freely  sold  in  the  foreign  concessions,  and 
the  Chinese  are  powerless  to  prevent  it.  At 
present  they  are  making  a  determined  and  gal- 


52  PEKING  DUST 

lant  fight  against  the  opium  habit,  which  was 
forced  upon  them  by  Great  Britain  as  the  re- 
sult of  two  successful  opium  wars,  and  legal- 
ized by  treaties  that,  to  say  the  least,  were  ex- 
torted from  the  helpless  Chinese.  The  ratifi- 
cation of  these  treaties  made  it  all  right  for 
Great  Britain  to  import  opium  as  freely  as  she 
liked.  Well,  ten  years  ago,  after  a  century 
and  a  half  of  opium  traffic,  poor  old  China 
made  a  stand  against  this  evil  and  determined 
to  overcome  it.  She  entered  into  a  contract 
with  Great  Britain,  by  the  terms  of  which 
England  agreed  to  decrease  her  opium  imports 
year  by  year,  for  a  period  of  ten  years,  in  pro- 
portion as  China  decreased,  year  by  year,  her 
poppy  cultivation.  Both  sides  have  kept  the 
faith,  and  the  end  of  the  bargain  will  be  cele- 
brated by  rejoicing  (Chinese)  on  April  1, 
1917,  when  the  ten-year  contract  expires. 

It  has  been  a  colossal  struggle  against  al- 
most overwhelming  odds.  For  a  nation  as 
weak,  as  unwieldy,  as  corrupt  as  China  to  un- 
dertake such  a  stupendous  task  seems  almost 
inconceivable.  Accurate  statistics  are  not 


FOREIGNERS  53 

available,  but  it  would  seem  that  one-half  of 
the  Chinese  were  in  the  grip  of  this  vice.  In 
some  provinces  about  ninety  per  cent,  of  the 
officials  were  addicted  to  opium-smoking,  and 
in  all  provinces  a  huge  percentage  of  the  peo- 
ple were  addicts.  Anyway,  China  has  made 
this  gigantic  effort  to  get  rid  of  opium,  and  she 
has  almost  succeeded ;  April  1  of  next  year  will 
see  the  end  of  the  whole  sordid  business.  But 
no  assistance  has  been  given  her  in  this  enor- 
mous task;  she  has  accomplished  it  alone. 
During  this  ten-years'  struggle  she  has  had  to 
contend  not  only  against  the  inclinations  of 
her  drug-sodden  people  but  against  the  fact 
that  her  people  could  procure  opium  freely  in 
the  foreign  concessions,  over  which  the  Chinese 
have  no  control. 

The  bargain  between  China  and  Great 
Britain,  however,  has  been  lived  up  to.  The 
Chinese  began  to  plant  poppies  when  they  were 
unable  to  curb  or  suppress  the  British  imports. 
As  long  as  the  vice  was  to  be  fastened  upon 
the  country  by  treaties,  they  shrewdly  decided 
that  at  least  all  the  money  spent  for  opium 


54  PEKING  DUST 

should  not  go  out  of  the  country;  therefore 
they  started  in  on  poppy  cultivation  on  their 
own  account.  But  this  native  cultivation  has 
been  almost  entirely  suppressed  in  the  last  ten 
years,  and  the  supplies  of  both  native  and  for- 
eign opium  will  reach  the  vanishing-point  on 
April  1,  1917.  But  it  seems  pretty  hard  to 
realize  that  the  foreign  governments  have  given 
China  no  assistance  in  this  struggle.  It  is  too 
lucrative  a  trade.  The  Peking  papers  are  al- 
ready talking  of  the  great  day,  only  six  months 
distant,  when  China  will  have  freed  herself 
from  this  curse.  We  are  determined  to  be  here 
in  Peking  to  witness  the  celebration. 

But  that  brings  me  back  to  my  starting- 
point,  the  fact  that  foreigners  are  not  subject 
to  Chinese  laws.  In  his  own  concession  the 
foreigner  is  amenable  to  the  laws  of  his  own 
country.  If  on  Chinese  soil  he  violates  Chi- 
nese law,  all  that  the  Chinese  can  do  is  to  hand 
him  to  his  nearest  consul,  who  may  or  may  not 
punish  him.  And  this  immunity  from  respon- 
sibility, this  arrogant  privilege  of  doing  as  one 
likes  on  Chinese  soil,  with  very  small  chance 


FOREIGNERS  55 

of  being  brought  to  book  for  it,  has  a  demoral- 
izing influence  upon  the  average  foreigner  who 
comes  out  here.  Between  ourselves,  the  class 
of  foreigners  who  come  to  China  don't  amount 
to  much.  "Beach-combers"  they  were  called 
in  the  good  old  days — adventurers,  gamblers, 
shady  characters  of  all  sorts,  and  pretty  well 
dwarfed  ethically.  But  no  matter  what  they 
did,  they  were  usually  supported  by  their  va- 
rious governments,  and  the  result  to-day  is  a 
well-defined  fear  of  the  foreigner,  a  desire  to 
sidestep  him,  to  stand  from  under.  It  seems 
rather  cowardly,  this  cringing  attitude  on  the 
part  of  the  Chinese,  but  it  is  the  result  of  a  cen- 
tury of  experience  with  the  ethics  of  the  West. 
Brave  men,  unarmed,  have  been  known  to 
throw  up  their  hands  in  the  presence  of  a 
bandit. 

An  amusing  thing  happened  to-day.  After 
tiffin  E—  -  and  I  went  out  in  our  rickshaws, 
trying  to  find  a  shop  where  we  could  buy 
camel's-hair  blankets.  And,  by  the  way,  there 
are  n't  any,  so  we  had  a  fruitless  quest.  We 
each  have  our  own  rickshaw  now,  hired  by  the 


56  PEKING  DUST 

month  at  twenty  dollars  (Mexican)  apiece. 
It  seems  miserably  cheap,  yet  they  tell  us  that 
we  have  paid  five  dollars  more  than  the  usual 
rate.  It  was  pathetic  when  we  chose  our  boys 
the  other  day — chose  two  out  of  a  crowd  of 
thirty  or  more  that  presented  themselves.  The 
disappointment  of  the  others  was  pitiable. 
Competition  is  keen,  and  it  means  much  to 
these  boys  to  know  they  have  an  assured  in- 
come rather  than  haphazard,  precarious  em- 
ployment. My  boy  is  called  Kwong,  and  is  a 
wonderful  little  runner,  much  faster  than 

E 's  boy. 

By  this  time  we  are  much  attached  to  them, 
and  our  days  usually  end  up  at  the  bazaar  out 
on  Morrison  Street,  that  marvelous  bazaar 
where  everything  made  in  North  China  is  for 
sale — furs,  silks,  jade,  jewels,  sweetmeats, 
everything.  But  it  is  to  the  sweet-stalls  that 
we  always  go,  where  wonderful  Chinese  can- 
dies and  sugared  fruits  are  for  sale.  We  first 
change  a  dollar  into  pennies,  and  then  all  four 
of  us  eat  our  way  from  stall  to  stall — sesame 
candy,  sugared  walnuts,  sugary  plums  on 


FOREIGNERS  57; 

straws.  It 's  wonderful.  Germs  ?  Maybe, 
but  we  don't  care.  I  am  sick  of  germs,  of  the 
emphasis  that  every  one  at  home  places  on 
them.  It 's  restful  to  get  into  a  country  where 
there  are  n't  any,  or  at  least  people  don't  know 
about  them.  The  trouble  with  America  is 
that  every  one  is  so  busy  thinking  of  clean 
streets,  clean  garbage-cans,  the  possibilities  of 
disease  contained  in  impure  food,  that  much 
of  the  beauty  and  comfort  of  life  is  lost.  Life 
is  not  all  in  length. 

Well,  as  I  say,  with  our  visit  to  the  bazaar 
reserved  for  the  end  of  the  afternoon,  we  went 
into  the  Chinese  City  in  search  of  camel's-hair 
blankets.  Soon  we  turned  aside  from  the  big 
high-street,  and  dived  into  one  of  the  narrow, 
winding,  unpaved  lanes  of  the  native  city, 
which  only  the  rickshaw-boys  can  negotiate. 
Presently,  in  this  maze  of  narrow  streets,  we 
met  the  usual  block;  a  dozen  rickshaws  from 
opposite  directions  encountered  one  another, 
and  each  claimed  the  right  of  way.  When  an 
alley  is  six  feet  wide,  there  is  neither  right  nor 
way,  and  voluble  conversation  ensued,  mount- 


58  PEKING  DUST 

ing  rapidly  into  screams  and  curses.  Coolies 
and  passengers  alike  took  part  in  the  discus- 
sion, and  as  we  were  the  only  foreigners,  we 
felt  handicapped  by  our  lack  of  language. 
The  storm  of  yells  mounted  higher  and  higher, 
when  suddenly  the  crowd  gave  way  a  little, 
and  E—  -'s  boy  managed  to  slide  through, 
while  Kwong,  pulling  me,  slipped  close  behind. 
Indignity!  It  seems  the  passage  had  been 
cleared  for  a  young  Chinese  gentleman,  clad  in 
gorgeous  brocade,  an  official,  perhaps,  since 
he  had  all  the  marks  of  wealth  and  position. 
As  we  ran  past,  into  the  space  opened  for 
him,  the  young  official  leaned  forward  and 
shouted  some  insult  into  Kwong's  ear,  and 
Kwong  made  some  furious  retort.  Instantly 
the  young  official  jumped  from  his  rickshaw, 
dashed  up  to  Kwong,  and  struck  him  between 
the  eyes.  Poor  little  Kwong  staggered,  and 
dropped  the  shafts,  and  I  leaped  out  and 
caught  the  wrists  of  the  young  gentleman  just 
as  he  was  aiming  another  blow  at  my  unhappy 
boy.  What  happened?  While  I  held  firmly 
pinioned  the  hands  of  the  young  gentleman, 


FOREIGNERS  59 

Kwong  recovered,  and  proceeded  to  deal  the 
official  a  series  of  stunning  blows !  He  would 
have  fallen  except  for  my  hold  on  his  wrists. 

"Kwong,  stop  it!  Behave  yourself!"  I 
shouted,  and  released  the  official  in  order  to 
seize  Kwong.  Whereupon  the  young  gentle- 
man pounded  Kwong  anew.  I  was  unable  to 
hold  the  hands  of  both ;  could  seize  only  one  at 
a  time,  and  my  part  soon  resolved  itself  into 
pinioning  one  belligerent  while  the  other  struck 
him!  A  silly  role,  I  must  say.  Impartially 
holding  up  first  one,  then  the  other,  for  pun- 
ishment! At  a  modest  estimate,  I  should  say 
that  one  half  the  population  of  Peking 
swarmed  out  of  adjacent  lanes  and  burrows 
to  see  the  excitement,  and  amidst  the  pan- 
demonium of  yells  I  heard  some  one  shouting 
in  English:  "Police  house!  Police  house!" 
The  finish  came  when  E—  -'s  boy  came  to  the 
rescue  with  a  hearty  kick  to  the  young  man, 
after  which  the  fighters  broke  away,  and  every 
one  took  to  their  rickshaws  and  made  off  with 
all  speed. 

It  was  too  much.     To  go  out  on  a  peaceful 


60  PEKING  DUST 

shopping  expedition,  and  become  involved  in 
a  free-for-all  fight!  Some  one  of  us  lost  face 
by  that  episode,  whether  the  official,  Kwong, 
or  myself,  I  'm  not  sure.  There  was  n't  much 
prestige  to  the  whole  thing.  Just  one  fact 
stands  out  clearly  amidst  that  maze  of  swift 
events.  At  the  end  of  the  street,  about  fifty 
feet  beyond  that  wild  mob,  stood  a  Chinese  po- 
liceman. One  hasty  look  he  gave  to  the  af- 
fair, and  seeing  that  some  foreign  ladies  were 
involved,  he  decided  to  keep  out  of  it.  He  kept 
his  back  turned  the  entire  time,  with  his  hands 
tight  in  the  pockets  of  his  padded  trousers. 


VII 

DONKEYS   GENERALLY 

IT  'S  all  delightful  here  every  moment  of 
the  day.  The  excitement  begins  every 
morning  at  breakfast  with  the  unfolding  of 
"The  Peking  Gazette."  I  come  down-stairs 
early,  when  the  corridors  are  being  swept  and 
dusted  by  the  China-boys  in  their  long  blue 
coats,  and  receive  a  series  of  "Morning, 
Missy's"  on  my  way  to  the  breakfast-room,  the 
nice,  warm  breakfast-room,  with  oilcloth-cov- 
ered floor,  and  everything  else  simple  accord- 
ingly. There  is  gilding  in  the  big  dining-room, 
but  the  breakfast-room  is  as  simple  as  a  New 
England  boarding-house.  One  boy  pulls  out 
my  chair,  another  opens  my  napkin, — they 
look  after  you  well  here, — and  a  third  boy,  the 
regular  waiter,  leans  over  and  says,  "Pollidge, 
Missy?"  and  a  moment  later  brings  a  big  bowl 

61 


62  PEKING  DUST 

of  porridge  and  a  can  of  cream.  There  is 
nothing  but  tinned  milk  and  cream  in  China, 
for  there  are  no  cows.  There  is  no  room  to 
pasture  cows  or  to  feed  them,  for  one  cow  can 
eat  as  much  food  as  twenty  people,  so  no  land 
can  be  devoted  to  such  superfluities  as  that. 
One  of  the  legations  has  a  cow,  however,  and 
people  who  stand  in  well  with  the  legation  can 
have  such  milk  as  there  may  be  over  and  above 
the  legation's  needs.  But  the  Wagons-Lits 
Hotel  is  not  on  that  list,  and,  as  I  say,  tinned 
cream  is  all  that  I  get  for  my  "pollidge."  But 
it  is  very  good  indeed,  these  chilly  October 
mornings.  After  all,  what  does  food  matter? 
Peking  is  so  rich  in  other  things! 

To-day  at  breakfast,  with  the  "Gazette" 
propped  against  the  coffee-pot,  I  began  my 
usual  search  for  news.  Found  it,  too,  in  a 
moment,  in  the  editorial  column.  A  fairly 
long  leader,  entitled,  "The  Shanghai  Opium 
Combine:  Frantic  Efforts  to  Secure  Further 
Privileges  in  China,"  caused  me  to  forget  "pol- 
lidge" and  everything  else,  and  to  read  hastily 
to  the  end.  As  I  told  you  the  other  day,  the 


DONKEYS  GENERALLY        68 

opium  traffic  in  China  is  to  come  to  an  end  in 
six  months.  Well,  this  article  says  that  the 
Shanghai  Opium  Combine,  the  combination  of 
a  dozen  British  firms  with  headquarters  in 
Shanghai,  is  making  frantic  efforts  to  prolong 
the  time  limit  for  the  sale  of  opium,  to  extend 
it  for  another  nine  months.  The  excuse  of- 
fered is  that  the  combine  has  not  sufficient  time 
between  this  and  April  1,  1917,  to  sell  off  its 
remaining  stocks  of  opium,  and  in  consequence 
it  is  appealing  to  the  British  authorities  to 
bring  pressure  upon  the  Chinese  Government 
to  extend  the  time  by  nine  months.  Accord- 
ing to  the  "Gazette,"  the  combine  has  "worked 
hard  to  induce  the  local  British  consul-general 
once  more  to  enlist  his  sympathies  for  the 
Opium  combine;  but,  happily,  the  latter  has 
peremptorily  declined  to  do  anything  of  the 
sort.  It  is  reliably  reported  that  the  British 
Minister  at  Peking,  Sir  John  Jordan,  was  simi- 
larly approached,  and  the  latter  has  equally 
refused  to  recognize  the  combine  any  longer. 
As  a  last  resort,  they  telegraphed  to  the  Lon- 
don Foreign  Office  for  support,  in  their  desire 


64  PEKING  DUST 

to  compel  either  the  Chinese  Government  or 
the  local  Municipal  Council  [at  Shanghai]  to 
aid  them  to  secure  their  nine-months'  privilege. 
The  decision  of  the  London  Foreign  Office  is 
awaited  with  feverish  interest,  although  it  is 
considered  doubtful  whether  any  good  result 
can  be  achieved." 

Think  of  China's  position — having  to  await 
with  "feverish  interest"  the  decision  of  the 
British  Government  as  to  whether  or  not  it  will 
be  possible  for  China  to  suppress  the  opium 
traffic  at  the  end  of  the  ten-years'  agreement! 
The  sale  and  manufacture  of  opium  is  a  mo- 
nopoly of  the  British  Government,  just  as 
vodka  was  a  monopoly  of  the  Russian  Govern- 
ment at  the  beginning  of  the  war.  The 
Shanghai  Opium  Combine  is  the  distributing 
agent  of  this  British  opium,  and  until  the  be- 
ginning of  this  ten-years'  struggle  China  was 
an  important  customer.  The  loss  of  revenue 
to  the  British  Government  through  the  closure 
of  the  Chinese  market  is  a  very  serious  item. 
And  these  rumblings,  these  hints  of  pressure 
being  brought  to  bear  upon  China,  are  pretty 


DONKEYS  GENERALLY        65 

ugly.  Anyway,  the  "Gazette"  is  aroused  to 
the  danger,  and  the  "Gazette"  is  nothing  if  not 
outspoken,  and  will  give  the  matter  full  pub- 
licity if  anything  goes  wrong.  Only  it  makes 
one  uneasy.  Poor  old  China ! 

We  went  on  such  a  pleasant  expedition  to- 
day. It  was  arranged  last  night  on  receipt  of 
an  informal  note  from  Dr.  Reinsch,  our  min- 
ister, asking  if  we  would  go  with  him  on  a  don- 
key-trip to  a  temple  in  the  hills  outside  Peking. 
Out  came  our  khaki  clothes,  bought  for  just 
such  an  emergency,  for  nothing  is  more  appro- 
priate for  a  donkey-ride  than  our  khaki  skirts 
and  breeches  and  leggings. 

There  are  two  railway  stations  in  Peking, 
usually  spoken  of  as  "the  station"  and  "the 
other  station."  From  "the  station"  trains  run 
down  to  Shanghai  or  up  into  Manchuria  and 
Mukden,  and  connect  with  the  Trans-Siberian 
and  other  far-away,  thrilling  places.  The 
"other  station"  takes  one  out  into  the  country 
somewhere,  to  various  outlying  spots  in  the 
hills,  and  it  was  to  one  of  these  places  that  we 
were  bound.  When  we  arrived  we  found  the 


66  PEKING  DUST 

other  members  of  the  party  waiting  for  us. 
We  were  all  early,  ahead  of  time,  for  Chinese 
trains  have  certain  idiosyncrasies  that  must  be 
reckoned  with.  Scheduled  to  start  at  a  certain 
hour,  they  frequently  leave  five  or  ten  minutes 
ahead  of  time,  or  whenever  the  guard  thinks 
that  no  more  people  are  coming.  All  six  of 
our  party  found  ourselves  at  the  station  well 
ahead  of  time,  having  been  warned  of  this  pe- 
culiarity of  Chinese  railways.  Dr.  Reinsch's 
two  servants  were  on  hand  to  buy  the  tickets 
and  to  carry  large  and  imposing  lunch-baskets. 
Soon  we  were  all  installed  in  an  antiquated 
railway-carriage,  first  class  by  courtesy  only, 
with  half  an  hour's  ride  before  us. 

Pandemonium  greeted  us  when  we  alighted 
on  the  platform  of  a  dusty  little  station — a 
small  house  solitary  upon  the  vast  plain.  Pan- 
demonium came  from  the  donkey-drivers  who 
were  expecting  us,  thirty  or  forty  at  least,  each 
one  dragging  forward  a  reluctant  donkey, 
praising  its  merits  and  himself  as  donkey- 
driver,  and  disparaging  all  the  other  donkeys 
and  drivers  and  battling  for  our  helpless  per- 


DONKEYS  GENERALLY         67 

sons.  What  can  you  do  when  a  towering 
coolie  takes  a  firm  clutch  on  your  arm,  and, 
with  an  equally  firm  grip  on  his  donkey's 
bridle,  drags  you  and  the  donkey  together  and 
is  about  to  lift  you  on  the  animal's  back,  when 
you  are  suddenly  jerked  in  an  opposite  direc- 
tion by  an  equally  firm  hand  and  confront  an- 
other stubborn  and  reluctant  donkey  and  are 
about  to  be  boosted  upon  that,  when  you  are 
clutched  from  the  rear  and  meet  a  third  pos- 
sibility! Mercifully,  our  khaki  clothes  were 
new  and  strong  and  stood  the  jerking  and  haul- 
ing without  giving  way  at  a  single  seam.  Out 
of  the  melee  peace  was  finally  restored.  Some 
one  got  me,  and  the  others  also  were  captured, 
the  yells  finally  died  down,  and  we  set  off  over 
the  plains,  all  mounted  on  donkeys  much  too 
small.  Saddles?  Not  at  all.  A  square  seat, 
about  as  wide  and  unyielding  as  a  table-top, 
was  strapped  securely  to  each  donkey,  and  to 
this  seat  we  clung,  with  no  secureness  at  all. 
An  exceedingly  wide  seat  it  was,  with  stirrups 
dangling  somewhere  out  of  reach,  and  which 
could  not  be  reached  even  by  the  widest  effort 


68  PEKING  DUST 

to  straddle  that  square  wide  pad.  Behind  each 
donkey  ran  its  owner,  flicking  its  heels  with 
a  long-lashed  whip,  urging  it  to  a  speed  likely 
to  pitch  one  off  at  any  minute. 

Do  you  think  donkeys  are  sure-footed?  I 
had  thought  so  up  to  this  time.  By  no  means. 
These  little  beasts  stumbled  constantly,  their 
little  ankles  having  been  so  strained  by  the 
heavy  burdens  they  ordinarily  carry  that  they 
seemed  to  give  way  at  every  step.  We  had 
eleven  miles  of  this,  over  a  rough,  uneven  road, 
across  the  dusty  plain,  mounting  gradually  to- 
ward the  hills  through  loose  and  rolling  stones. 
It  was  a  gray  day,  with  rain  threatening,  and 
when  we  finally  reached  our  temple,  Je  Tai 
Ssu,  the  rain  began  in  a  steady  drizzle,  and 
steadily  continued. 

The  temple  was  most  interesting.  We 
stiffly  rolled  off  our  donkeys,  and  wandered 
through  the  multitude  of  courtyards,  in  and 
out  of  the  many  buildings,  filled  with  fine  carv- 
ing and  beautiful  color.  A  few  priests  were 
at  hand,  deferential  but  unobtrusive,  and 
when  we  finally  sat  down  to  lunch  at  a  big  table 


DONKEYS  GENERALLY        69 

placed  in  the  courtyard  before  the  main  temple, 
they  surrounded  us  silently,  filled  with  curi- 
osity. The  boys  had  placed  our  table  under 
a  tree,  which  did  something,  but  not  much,  to 
shelter  us  from  the  rain  that  fell  during  the 
meal,  dripping  through  the  bare  branches. 
Below  us  spread  a  magnificent  vista  of  more 
hills,  a  great,  far-reaching  panorama,  with  the 
old  Summer  Palace  in  the  distance.  In  all  di- 
rections we  could  see  temples  perching  on  the 
distant  hills — temples  which  are  no  longer  used 
as  such  but  are  the  summer  homes  of  the  for- 
eign residents  of  Peking.  They  were  all 
pointed  out  to  us.  Over  yonder  was  Mr.  So- 
and-So's  temple;  beyond,  on  that  hilltop,  was 
Mrs.  So-and-So's,  all  occupied  during  the  sum- 
mer months  by  foreigners  who  escape  from 
Peking  in  the  hot  weather.  At  once  we  be- 
came fired  with  a  desire  to  rent  one,  too. 
Thirty  Mexican  dollars  a  season,  a  hundred 
Mexican  dollars  a  year;  not  exorbitant,  surely! 
Besides  the  priests,  the  pariah  dogs,  or 
"wonks,"  watched  our  meal  with  intense  inter- 
est. They  stood  by  in  a  silent  circle,  monks 


70  PEKING  DUST 

and  wonks,  and  our  gay  tiffin  proceeded  undis- 
turbed except  by  the  pattering  rain.  But  the 
rain  was  increasing  in  violence,  so  we  left  soon 
after  the  meal,  and  it  was  far  from  easy  to 
straddle  our  donkeys  again  and  retrace  our 
way  across  the  stones  and  sand.  From  time 
to  time  we  dismounted  and  tried  to  walk,  but 
it  was  difficult  to  keep  pace  with  our  galloping 
animals,  eager  to  return  home.  Time  was 
pressing,  so  we  were  finally  obliged  to  ride,  be- 
coming stiff er  and  sorer  every  minute.  In 
single  file  as  we  had  come,  we  made  our  way 
back.  Presently  I  heard  a  sort  of  flumping 
sound  behind  me,  and  I  turned,  to  see  E— 
and  her  donkey  lying  side  by  side  in  the  road, 
motionless.  Dr.  Reinsch  jumped  off  his  ani- 
mal, I  rolled  off  mine,  and  we  both  ran  back 
to  the  bundles  of  khaki  and  fur  lying  together 
at  full  length. 

"Are  you  hurt?"  I  asked  anxiously. 

"Mercy  no!"  replied  E ,   contentedly. 

"Leave  me  alone !     Most  comfortable  position 
I  've  been  in  all  day !" 


VIII 

ADVISERS   AND   ADVICE 

THERE  is  another  quaint  custom  here, 
which,  as  far  as  I  know,  is  unique  in  the 
history  of  international  relations.  That  is  the 
custom  of  giving  advice  to  China.  Any  coun- 
try can  do  it,  apparently.  Any  country  that 
thinks  China  would  be  benefited  by  a  little  dis- 
interested and  helpful  counsel  can  see  that  she 
gets  it — and  that  she  pays  for  it,  too.  Any 
person  who  wishes  a  lucrative  position  can  get 
his  government  to  appoint  him  as  an  "adviser" 
to  China,  and  his  government  will  see  to  it  that 
China  pays  him  a  salary.  As  far  as  I  know, 
China  does  not  ask  for  this  advice ;  it  is  thrust 
upon  her  unsought.  But  she  must  pay  for 
the  privilege,  whether  she  likes  it  or  not.  So 
over  they  come,  these  various  "advisers"  from 
various  foreign  nations,  and  settle  down  here 
in  Peking  as  the  official  adviser  of  this  and 

that,  and  draw  their  salaries  from  this  bank- 

71 


72  PEKING  DUST 

rupt  old  government.  The  China  Year  Book 
for  1916  gives  a  list  of  twenty-five  such  ad- 
visers, British,  American,  French,  Russian, 
Dutch,  German,  Italian,  Japanese,  Danish, 
Belgian,  and  Swedish.  There  is  the  political 
adviser  to  the  President;  to  the  ministry  of 
finance ;  in  connection  with  the  five-power  loan ; 
to  the  ministry  of  war;  on  police  matters;  to 
the  ministry  of  communications;  legal  advice; 
advice  on  the  preparation  of  the  constitution; 
advice  to  the  bureau  of  forestry,  and  to  the 
mining  department  of  the  ministry  of  agri- 
culture and  commerce.  In  addition  to  all  this 
paid  "advice,"  there  is  of  course  the  unpaid, 
voluntary  "advice,"  equally  disinterested  and 
helpful,  of  the  various  foreign  legations  in 
Peking.  No  wonder  the  poor  old  Chinese 
Government  is  distraught  and,  as  some  one 
said  last  evening,  in  a  state  of  anarchy.  Who 
wouldn't  be  in  the  circumstances?  I  wonder 
how  long  Washington  would  tolerate  such  a 
string  of  "advisers,"  all  appointed  willy-nilly, 
and  paid  for  by  the  American  Government. 
They  say  that  some  one  once  wrote  a  book  en- 


ADVISERS  AND  ADVICE        73 

titled,  "Advising  China  to  Death,"  but  it  was 
never  published.  Some  one  advised  against  it, 
probably. 

Another  thing  that  China  is  not  allowed  to 
do  is  to  regulate  her  customs  duties.  This 
poor  old  country,  rich  as  she  is  or  as  she  might 
become,  has  virtually  no  revenue,  for  she  is  al- 
lowed to  have  but  a  nominal  tariff.  There  is 
no  use  in  developing  her  industries,  she  can't 
protect  them,  or  hedge  them  in  with  any  sort  of 
protective  tariff.  It  is  not  allowed.  She  must 
first  consult  with  some  seventeen  different 
powers  if  she  wishes  to  raise  the  duty  on  a  sin- 
gle item.  And  if  one  power  that  does  not  im- 
port a  certain  article  into  China  is  willing  to 
have  a  duty  laid  on  that  article,  this  decision 
will  not  be  agreeable  to  another  power  that 
imports  a  lot  of  it.  So  it  goes.  It  is  pretty 
hard  to  find  seventeen  powers  all  in  accord. 
The  great  nations  allow  old  China  just  enough 
revenue  to  return  to  them  in  the  shape  of 
Boxer  indemnities ;  nothing  more. 

Oh,  disabuse  your  mind  of  the  fact  that 
China  is  a  sovereign  state !  She  is  bound  hand 


74  PEKING  DUST 

and  foot,  helpless,  mortgaged  up  to  the  hilt. 
Every  foreigner  in  China  knows  it,  and  the 
Chinese  know  it  themselves  only  too  well.  It 
seems  such  a  farce  to  give  them  the  courtesy 
title  of  sovereignty.  I  don't  think  you  realize, 
never  having  been  in  this  country,  what  a  farce 
it  really  is.  I  am  not  able  to  write  you  a 
learned  book.  All  I  can  do  is  to  write  you 
these  letters,  which  are  surely  devoid  of  all 
legal  verbiage,  because  I  don't  know  any.  If 
I  were  a  scholar,  a  student  of  international 
politics,  I  would  wrap  all  my  statements  in  fine, 
well-chosen  language,  quoting  treaties  and  acts 
and  agreements  and  all  the  rest  of  it,  and  you 
would  n't  know  what  it  all  meant.  I  can  only 
give  you  the  facts  as  they  disclose  themselves 
to  me  from  day  to  day.  I  can  also  tell  you 
that  every  one  over  here — all  the  foreigners  I 
mean — laugh  at  China  and  ridicule  her  and 
make  fun  of  her  weak,  corrupt  government,  of 
her  inertia  and  helplessness,  and  think  what 
she  gets  is  good  enough  for  her. 

I  grow  so  tired  of  all  this  talk  about  the  cor- 
ruptness of  the  Chinese !     They  are  corrupt,  all 


ADVISERS  AND  ADVICE        75 

the  officials,  or  the  greater  part  of  them.  But 
you  don't  hear  much  about  those  who  corrupt 
them.  Why?  Because  it  suits  the  great 
Western  nations  to  keep  this  government  in  a 
state  of  weakness,  of  indecision,  of  susceptibil- 
ity to  bribes  and  threats ;  it  makes  China  easier 
to  control.  The  one  ray  of  hope  for  China  lies 
in  the  fact  that  there  are  so  many  foreign  na- 
tions trying  to  gain  control  of  her.  One  could 
do  it,  two  could  do  it,  three  could  do  it,  but  a 
dozen !  China  plays  off  one  greedy  predatory 
power  against  another.  One  "adviser"  ar- 
ranges everything  nicely  in  the  interests  of  his 
country,  and  then  what  does  the  "corrupt" 
Chinese  official  do?  Runs  off  and  tattles  it 
all  to  some  other  "adviser,"  whose  interests  will 
be  damaged  if  the  advice  of  Number  One  goes 
through.  It  is  a  tremendous  game,  each  for- 
eign power  striving  to  cut  the  ground  from 
under  the  next  foreign  power  and  to  gain  the 
ascendency  for  itself.  Diplomatic  Peking  is 
a  great,  silent  battle-ground;  on  the  surface 
Oriental  politeness  and  suave  political  courte- 
sies but  underneath  a  seething  sea  of  strife. 


76  PEKING  DUST 

The  Chinese  attitude  toward  all  this  reminds 
me  of  a  story  I  heard  long  ago.  Two  negroes 
were  discussing  a  negro  girl. 

"Trus'  dat  niggah?"  said  one;  "trus'  dat 
niggah?  I  wouldn't  trus'  her  'hind  a  corn- 
stalk!" 

Yes,  many  of  the  Chinese  are  corrupt. 
They  have  their  price.  For  example,  the  old 
palace  in  the  Forbidden  City  is  now  a  museum, 
holding  one  of  the  most  superb  collections  of 
Chinese  treasures  in  the  world,  all  that  re- 
mains from  the  imperial  go-downs.  This  col- 
lection is  not  catalogued,  however,  and  every 
few  months  the  exhibits  are  changed  and  others 
substituted ;  for  the  collection  is  too  large,  they 
say,  for  everything  to  be  kept  on  view  at  one 
time.  At  such  times  as  the  exhibits  are 
changed,  current  Peking  gossip  has  it,  certain 
of  the  finest  treasures  disappear.  They  are 
said  to  find  their  way  into  the  currents  of  trade, 
to  enrich  the  museums  of  Europe  and  Amer- 
ica. Put  this  down  as  you  like,  however,  the 
conventional  explanation  for  this  is  that  the 
Chinese  are  so  corrupt! 


IX 

CHINESE   HOUSES 

WE  are  really,  seriously  looking  for  a 
house  in  Peking,  in  which  to  set  up  a 
Peking  cart,  a  white  mule,  a  camel,  and  a  Mon- 
golian dog!  That  shows  what  the  Orient  does 
to  one  in  a  few  short  weeks,  how  it  changes 
one's  whole  point  of  view.  A  month  ago 
neither  of  us  had  any  idea  of  staying  in  Peking 
for  more  than  two  or  three  weeks ;  we  had  in- 
tended to  stop  long  enough  to  see  the  obvious 
things,  temples  and  such,  and  then  go  down  to 
the  tropics  for  the  winter.  Now  we  are  on  the 
verge  of  giving  up  our  trip  to  Angkor  and  of 
settling  right  here — I  was  almost  going  to  say 
for  life !  And  all  in  a  few  short  weeks ! 

There  is  so  much  beauty  and  style  in  a  Chi- 
nese house,  and  most  of  the  people  we  know 
have  them,  and  we  are  becoming  tired  of  being 

"tourists."    Let   me   describe   these   Chinese 

77 


78  PEKING  DUST 

houses.  Each  "house"  consists  of  anywhere 
from  two  to  a  hundred  little  separate  one-story 
buildings,  the  whole  collection  inclosed  by  a 
stone  wall,  ten  feet  high,  with  broken  glass  on 
top.  Within  this  compound,  or  surrounding 
and  protecting  wall,  the  various  houses  are  ar- 
ranged symmetrically  in  squares,  built  around 
courtyards  that  open  into  one  another.  They 
are  laid  off  with  beautiful  balance,  and  the 
courtyards,  large  or  small,  are  usually  paved 
with  stone.  Sometimes  trees  are  planted  in 
them,  or  bridges  and  rock  gardens  and  peony 
mountains  are  made.  The  finer  and  more  nu- 
merous the  houses,  the  more  beautiful  and  elab- 
orate the  architecture  of  these  separate,  sin- 
gle buildings,  the  larger  and  more  elaborate 
the  courtyards,  the  more  filled  they  are  with 
trees,  lilac-bushes,  stone  bridges,  and  other 
charming  details.  As  one  enters  the  com- 
pound, the  building  facing  one  is  the  residence 
of  the  mandarin  himself.  Back  of  it  lies  the 
house  of  his  "number-one"  wife,  and  back  of 
that,  each  surrounded  by  its  own  courtyard,  are 
the  houses  of  his  other  wives  and  of  the  various 


CHINESE  HOUSES  79 

members  of  his  family.  All  are  quite  separate 
one  from  the  other,  yet  all  are  connected  by 
passages  leading  through  moon-gates  in  the  di- 
viding walls,  one  courtyard  opening  into  an- 
other in  orderly,  yet  rather  confusing,  profu- 
sion. However,  we  are  not  looking  for  any- 
thing grand  and  imposing — a  palace  or  the 
abode  of  some  old  mandarin.  We  know  sev- 
eral people  who  live  in  such  stately  homes,  but 
we  shall  be  satisfied  with  a  simpler  house,  con- 
sisting of  fewer  buildings  and  fewer  court- 
yards. 

Inside  the  compounds,  these  various  separate 
buildings  are  divided  by  invisible  partitions  into 
"rooms."  In  the  ceiling  one  sees  arrange- 
ments by  which  a  wall  can  be  built  in,  a  screen 
adjusted, — a  big  carved  screen, — or  some  sort 
of  partition  erected  by  which  the  house  can  be 
further  subdivided.  These  possibilities  for 
subdivision,  whether  by  elaborately  carved 
woodwork  or  by  simple  paper  screens,  are  de- 
scribed as  rooms,  whether  partitioned  off  as 
such  or  left  open  as  one  big  one.  Therefore 
one  rents  one's  house  according  to  the  number 


80  PEKING  DUST 

of  rooms  it  may  be  divided  into,  whether  the 
division  is  made  or  not.  We  find  we  cannot 
possibly  live  in  a  house  of  less  than  twelve 
rooms,  or  four  by  ordinary  reckoning.  One 

house  (three  rooms)  for  E ,  one  for  me,  one 

for  a  salon,  one  for  the  dining-room.  This 
makes  four  rooms,  European  calculation, 
twelve  according  to  Chinese,  and  leaves  noth- 
ing for  guest-rooms,  trunk-rooms,  a  study,  or 
anything  of  the  kind.  Therefore,  all  joking 
aside,  a  house  of  a  hundred  rooms  might  do  for 
us  nicely! 

How  lovely  they  are,  these  one-story  stone 
houses,  with  their  tiled  roofs,  red  lacquered 
doors,  fine,  delicate  carvings  on  the  window- 
lattices,  and  all  the  rest  of  it!  The  floors  are 
of  stone,  but  foreigners  have  wooden  floors  laid 
down.  The  winters  are  bitter  here,  and  before 
these  Chinese  houses  can  be  made  comfortable 
according  to  Western  ideas,  much  must  be 
done  to  them.  Some  foreigners  put  in  glass 
windows  in  place  of  the  thick,  cottony  paper 
windows  of  the  Chinese.  The  paper  windows 
shut  out  the  cold,  it  is  true,  but,  being  opaque, 


CHINESE  HOUSES  81 

they  also  shut  out  the  sunlight.  And  how 
gorgeously  they  are  furnished!  Such  ebony 
chairs,  such  wonderful  carved  tables!  Now 
and  then  we  meet  some  one  who  has  picked  up 
an  old  opium  divan,  a  magnificent,  huge  bench 
of  carved  ebony,  with  marble  seat  and  marble 
back,  very  deep,  capable  of  holding  two  people 
lying  crosswise  at  full  length,  with  room  for 
the  smoker's  table  between  them.  Only,  the 
opium  tables  have  been  dispensed  with,  and 
their  place  is  taken  by  cushions  of  beautiful 
brocade,  of  rich  embroidery,  which  add  some- 
thing of  warmth  and  comfort  to  the  enormous 
couch.  Mind  you,  all  this  furniture  can  be 
bought  very  cheap.  To  live  Chinese  fashion 
is  not  expensive  at  all,  despite  the  impression  of 
magnificence  and  luxury,  which  is  rather  over- 
whelming. When  one  considers  that  the  most 
ordinary  Chinese  things  are  sold  in  America  at 
a  profit  of  three  or  four  hundred  per  cent.,  the 
outlay  for  Chinese  furniture  in  Peking  is  not 
great. 

As  to  heating,  stoves  do  it.     Every  room — 
I  mean  every  one  of  these  separate  buildings — 


82  PEKING  DUST 

is  heated  by  its  stove;  a  good  big  one,  too. 
Russian  stoves  are  found  here  and  there,  and 
any  one  who  possesses  a  Russian  stove  is  well 
equipped  to  withstand  the  bitterest  winter. 
Now  and  then  open  fireplaces  are  introduced, 
but  the  big  stoves  go  on  functioning  just  the 
same. 

These  Chinese  houses  are  charming  from 
the  outside.  You  wind  your  way  along  a  nar- 
row, unpaved  street,  or  hutung, — a  street  full 
of  little  open-air  shops,  cook-shops,  stalls  of 
various  kinds,  and  then  come  upon  a  high, 
blank  wall,  with  a  pair  of  stone  lions  at  the 
gateway  and  an  enormous  red  lacquer  gate, 
heavily  barred,  and  that 's  your  house.  The 
gateman  opens  to  your  ring,  and  as  the  big 
doors  swing  back  you  see  nothing  of  the  court- 
yard or  of  the  houses  within  the  inclosure ;  you 
are  confronted  by  the  devil  screen,  a  high  stone 
wall  about  fifteen  feet  long  and  ten  feet  high. 
This  devil  screen  blocks  the  evil  spirits  that  fly 
in  when  the  compound  gates  are  opened — the 
blind  evil  spirits,  that  can  fly  only  in  straight 
paths,  and  hence  crash  against  the  devil  screen 


CHINESE  HOUSES  83 

when  they  enter.  As  to  yourself,  the  gateman 
leads  you  round  the  screen,  and  across  the 
compound  to  the  master's  house.  Along  the 
compound  wall  that  gives  on  the  street  are  the 
servants'  quarters,  the  house  for  the  rickshaws, 
the  stables  for  the  big  mules  and  the  Peking 
carts,  and  the  house  of  the  gateman.  Life  is 
none  too  secure  in  these  compounds.  Robbers 
abound,  and  scale  the  walls,  and  slip  from  the 
roofs  of  adjacent  buildings  into  the  compounds. 
Every  household  is  in  a  constant  state  of  alert- 
ness, of  defense.  Broken  glass  covers  the  tops 
of  the  walls,  and  in  the  courtyards  Mongolian 
watch-dogs  guard  the  premises,  huge,  fierce, 
long-haired  creatures,  like  a  woolly  mastiff. 
Through  the  day  they  are  chained,  but  at  night 
they  are  unloosed.  Oh,  there  is  not  only  style 
but  excitement  in  living  in  a  native  house  in 
Peking !  We  have  looked  at  a  good  many  Chi- 
nese houses,  but  can't  quite  make  up  our  minds 
about  renting  one.  If  we  decide  to  stay,  it  will 
mean  that  we  must  give  up  our  trip  to  Angkor, 
and  it  was  to  make  that  trip  that  we  came  out 
to  the  Orient ! 


84  PEKING  DUST 

Not  every  foreigner  lives  in  a  Chinese  house, 
however.  There  are  a  few  European  ones, 
scattered  about  the  Tartar  City,  looking  so  out 
of  place,  so  insignificant  and  ugly!  The  for- 
eigners who  live  here  a  long  time  seem  to  like 
them,  however.  They  tell  us  that  after  a  time 
China  gets  on  one's  nerves.  Chinese  things 
become  utterly  distasteful,  and  one  becomes  so 
sick  of  Chinese  art  and  architecture  and  furni- 
ture that  one  must  approximate  a  home  like 
those  of  one's  own  country.  Therefore  there 
are  a  certain  number  of  these  "foreign-style" 
houses  to  be  found,  furnished  with  golden  oak 
furniture,  ugly  and  commonplace  to  a  degree. 
I  don't  know  how  a  long  residence  in  Peking 
would  affect  us.  At  present  we  are  too  newly 
arrived,  too  enthusiastic,  to  feel  any  sympathy 
with  this  point  of  view.  Let  me  add  that  when 
a  foreign-style  house  is  furnished  with  a  few 
Chinese  articles  tucked  in  a  background  of  mis- 
sion furniture,  the  result  is  disastrous.  One 
lady  we  met,  who  possesses  such  a  house,  recog- 
nized the  humor  of  the  situation. 


Entrance  fc'ate  to  compound  of   Chinese  house 


CHINESE  HOUSES  85 

"I  know,"  she  explained;  "it's  just  Eura- 
sian." 

We  are  undecided.  If  we  take  a  house  and 
settle  down,  we  must  give  up  our  nice,  warm 
little  rooms  at  the  old  Wagons-Lits,  forgo  all 
the  amusing  gossip  of  the  lobby,  told  in  such 
frankness  by  the  interesting  people  who  know 
things,  or  think  they  do.  They  say  housekeep- 
ing is  not  difficult  here.  You  engage  a  "num- 
ber-one boy,"  who  engages  the  rest  of  the  serv- 
ants, and  any  one  of  the  servants  who  finds 
himself  overworked  engages  as  many  more 
servants  as  he  may  require ;  but  that  is  not  your 
lookout.  The  compound  is  full  of  retainers, 
and  the  kitchen  as  well,  but  you  don't  have  to 
pay  for  them.  They  eat  you  out  of  house  and 
home,  squeeze  you  at  every  possible  point,  but 
add  an  air  of  the  picturesque  and  of  prosperity 
to  the  establishment.  Housekeeping  here  is  a 
throw-back  to  the  Middle  Ages,  with  a  baronial 
hall  filled  with  feudal  retainers.  And  all  for 
the  price,  except  for  the  "squeeze,"  of  one  serv- 
ant in  America! 


X 

HOW   IT'S   DONE   IN    CHINA 

WE  have  got  to  Peking  at  just  the  right 
moment — right  for  us,  that  is,  but  one 
of  the  wrong  moments  for  poor  old  China. 
These  cycles  of  Cathay,  I  may  mention,  are 
filled  with  such  moments  for  China,  and  this  is 
just  another  of  the  long  series,  another  of  the 
occasions  on  which  she  is  plundered.  Only 
here  we  are,  by  the  greatest  of  luck,  to  see  how 
it 's  done.  Could  anything  have  been  more 
fortunate  ?  Wait ;  I  '11  tell  you  about  it.  You 
will  hardly  believe  it.  We  should  not  have 
been  able  to  believe  it,  either,  if  it  had  not  taken 
place  under  our  very  noses. 

Day  before  yesterday  four  of  us  went  up  to 
see  the  Ming  tombs  and  the  Great  Wall. 
Everything  is  so  exciting  in  Peking  that  we 
could  hardly  bear  to  absent  ourselves  from  it 
even  for  two  days;  but,  having  come  all  the 

86 


HOW  IT  'S  DONE  IN  CHIN^    87 

way  out  to  China,  it  seemed  as  if  we  really 
ought  to  see  the  Great  Wall.  I  won't  describe 
our  trip.  You  can  read  descriptions  of  the 
wall  in  any  book;  all  I  can  say  is  that  it  took 
two  days  to  get  there  and  back,  and  that  we  set 
off  on  the  expedition  most  reluctantly. 

E 's  theory  is  that  it 's  best  to  get  all  the 

sights  crossed  off  as  soon  as  possible,  so  that  we 
can  enjoy  ourselves  with  a  clear  mind.  I  had 
a  presentiment  that  something  would  go  wrong 
if  we  left  Peking  for  such  a  long  time,  left 
China  alone  to  her  fate,  as  it  were,  for  forty- 
eight  hours.  But  E and  the  others 

thought  this  was  as  good  a  time  as  any,  so  in 
spite  of  our  misgivings,  we  took  advantage  of 
what  seemed  like  a  quiet  moment  and  slipped 
off  on  our  excursion,  to  get  it  over  with. 

When  we  returned  on  Monday  afternoon, 
we  found  the  whole  place  rocking  with  excite- 
ment, boiling  with  rage  and  resentment,  sim- 
ply seething  with  fury  and  indignation.  The 
hotel  was  ablaze.  The  moment  we  pushed 
open  the  big  front  door  and  entered — tired, 
dusty,  and  very  shabby  in  our  khaki  clothes — 


88  PEKING  DUST 

we  were  pounced  upon  and  asked  what  we 
thought  of  it.  Thought  of  what?  Well,  this. 
Night  before  last — the  19th  of  October,  to  be 
exact — the  French  had  grabbed  three  hundred 
and  thirty-three  acres  in  the  heart  of  Tientsin. 
The  attack,  or  charge,  or  party  of  occupation, 
whatever  you  choose  to  call  it,  was  led  in  per- 
son by  the  French  charge  d'affaires,  at  the  head 
of  a  band  of  French  soldiers.  They  seized  and 
arrested  all  the  Chinese  soldiers  on  duty  in  the 
district,  put  them  in  prison,  and  in  the  name  of 
the  Republic  of  France  annexed  three  hundred 
and  thirty-three  acres  of  Chinese  soil  to  the 
overseas  dominion  of  the  great  republic! 

Let  me  explain  what  this  means.  Tientsin 
is  a  large  city,  nearly  as  large  as  Peking,  with 
about  a  million  inhabitants.  It  is  only  two 
hours  distant  from  Peking,  by  rail,  and  is  the 
most  important  seaport  of  North  China, — the 
port  of  Peking.  Until  the  railway  was  built, 
a  few  years  ago,  the  only  way  to  reach  Peking 
(other  than  by  a  long  overland  journey)  was 
to  come  to  Tientsin  by  boat,  and  thence  to 
Peking  by  cart  or  chair.  In  spite  of  the  new 


HOW  IT  'S  DONE  IN  CHINA    89 

railway,  Tientsin  still  retains  its  old  impor- 
tance as  the  seaport  for  North  China,  and  is  a 
trade  center  of  the  first  rank.  To  seize  three 
hundred  and  thirty-three  acres  in  such  an  im- 
portant city  as  this,  was  an  act  of  no  small 
significance.  The  annexed  land,  containing 
wharfage,  streets,  houses,  shops,  and  the  reve- 
nue from  such,  makes  a  goodly  haul.  Really, 
from  the  French  point  of  view,  it  was  a  neat, 
thrifty  stroke  of  business,  or  of  diplomacy,  or 
of  international  politics,  whatever  you  choose 
to  call  it. 

But  from  the  Chinese  point  of  view  it  is  dif- 
ferent. How  are  they  taking  it,  the  Chinese? 
How  are  they  behaving?  Well,  in  spite  of  the 
fact  that  the  East  is  East  and  the  West  is 
West,  that  the  Chinese  are  nothing  but  a  yel- 
low race  and  heathen  at  that,  their  feelings  and 
reactions  seem  very  similar  to  what  I  imagine 
ours  would  be  in  similar  circumstances — I 
mean,  if  France  should  suddenly  "claim"  and 
"annex"  three  hundred  and  thirty -three  acres 
of  ground  in  the  heart  of  Boston  or  New  York. 
Their  newspapers  have  broken  out  into  flaring 


90  PEKING  DUST 

head-lines  an  inch  high,  and  are  wild  in  their 
denunciations  of  what  they  term  an  outrage; 
an  infamous,  high-handed  act,  a  wanton,  delib- 
erate theft  of  territory  from  a  peaceful  and 
friendly  country.  Really,  these  Chinese  news- 
papers seem  to  be  describing  the  business  in 
much  the  same  words,  with  much  the  same  force 
and  fury  and  resentment,  as  our  American  pa- 
pers probably  would  employ  in  describing  such 
an  episode  if  it  took  place  in  some  American 
city.  Only,  our  head-lines  would  probably  be 
a  little  larger.  However,  the  Chinese  newspa- 
pers do  very  well,  and  what  type  they  have 
seems  to  convey  their  meaning — rage  and  in- 
dignation. Mass  meetings  of  protest  against 
this  outrage  are  being  held  in  Peking,  in  Tien- 
tsin, in  all  the  provinces,  in  fact ;  the  governors 
of  the  different  provinces  are  sending  in  tele- 
grams; societies  and  organizations  are  tele- 
graphing to  the  Peking  government ;  the  whole 
country  is  wild  with  resentment  and  is  sending 
delegations  and  messages  and  protests  to  the 
poor  old  wabbly  Chinese  Government,  urging 
it  to  "act."  To  act;  that  is,  to  tell  the  French 


HOW  IT  'S  DONE  IN  CHINA    91 

'Government  to  hand  back  to  China  this  "ac- 
quired" land.  What  the  outcome  will  be,  I 
don't  know.  Apparently  the  supine,  terror- 
stricken  Chinese  Government  cannot  act, 
doesn't  dare.  Three  days  have  now  passed, 
and  the  French  are  still  sitting  tight,  holding 
to  their  fruits  of  victory,  facing  an  enraged  but 
helpless  country.  And  they  will  probably  con- 
tinue to  sit  tight  till  the  matter  blows  over. 

I  was  eager  to  find  out  what  constituted  the 
French  claim  to  this  particular  piece  of  terri- 
tory, called  Lao  Hsi  Kai.  The  French  al- 
ready possess  a  large  concession  in  Tientsin, 
and  why  they  should  have  wished  to  enlarge  it, 
particularly  in  such  a  summary  manner,  I  was 
anxious  to  discover.  Their  excuse  is  this :  they 
asked  for  this  Lao  Hsi  Kai  area  as  long  ago  as 
1902.  That 's  all.  Asked  for  it  years  ago, 
and  have  been  "claiming"  it  ever  since.  Have 
been  asking  for  it  at  intervals  during  all  these 
years.  When  the  first  request  was  made,  in 
1902,  the  ruling  official  in  Tientsin  considered 
it  so  insolent  that  he  tore  up  the  note  and  threw 
it  into  the  scrap-basket,  disdaining  a  reply. 


92  PEKING  DUST 

Since  then,  whenever  the  request  has  been  re- 
peated, the  Chinese  Government  has  played 
for  time,  has  deferred  the  answer,  delayed  the 
decision,  shilly-shallied,  avoided  the  issue  by 
every  means.  This  is  the  classic  custom  of  the 
Chinese  when  confronted  with  an  unpleasant 
decision, — to  play  for  time,  to  postpone  the  in- 
evitable, in  the  vain  hope  that  something  will 
turn  up  meanwhile,  some  new  condition  arise 
to  divert  the  attention  of  the  "powers  that 
prey."  Occasionally  this  method  works  but 
not  always.  Not  in  this  case,  anyway.  When 
a  European  power  asks  for  a  thing,  it  is  merely 
asserting  its  divine  right. 

We  have  talked  to  many  people  about  this 
Lao  Hsi  Kai  business,  people  of  all  ranks  and 
all  nationalities — diplomats,  old  residents, 
journalists,  business  men — and  not  one  of  them 
has  made  any  attempt  to  justify  or  defend  the 
action.  Without  exception,  they  say  it  is  an 
outrage,  and  totally  unwarranted, — at  the  very 
least,  a  most  shocking  political  blunder.  None 
of  them,  however,  has  come  forward  to  the  aid 
of  the  Chinese.  A  curious  conspiracy  of  si- 


HOW  IT  'S  DONE  IN  CHINA    93 

lence  seems  to  reign, — not  silence  in  one  sense, 
for  every  one  is  talking  freely  with  most  un- 
diplomatic candor,  and  in  private  every  one 
condemns  what  France  has  done,  yet  not  a 
voice  is  raised  in  public  protest.  The  Chinese 
alone  are  doing  their  own  protesting ;  and  much 
good  it  seems  to  do  them! 


XI 

THE  LAO-HSI-KAI   OUTRAGE 

A  WEEK  has  passed  since  the  French 
"acquired"  Lao  Hsi  Kai,  and  the  situ- 
ation remains  unchanged.  The  French  still 
sit  tight,  waiting  for  the  storm  to  blow  over; 
the  Chinese  continue  to  hold  their  protest 
meetings,  to  send  in  their  delegations  and  re- 
quests to  the  central  government  to  act;  the 
government  sits  supine,  afraid  to  budge;  and 
the  newspapers  continue  to  rave.  It  is  all 
most  interesting.  The  "Gazette"  devotes  al- 
most its  entire  eight  pages  to  what  it  calls  the 
"OUTRAGE"  and  has  n't  decreased  the  size  of  its 
type  one  bit.  If  it  had  larger  letters,  it  would 
probably  use  them.  I  should  think  that  by 
this  time,  after  such  long  and  painful  experi- 
ence with  foreign  powers,  it  would  have  laid 
in  a  stock  suitable  to  such  occasions. 

The  "Gazette"  is  an  annoying  sort  of  news- 

94 


THE  LAO-HSI-KAI  OUTRAGE     95 

paper, — annoying,  that  is,  to  the  powers  that 
prey.  Under  the  caption  "Madness  or  War," 
in  the  biggest  head-lines  it  has,  it  insists  upon 
describing  this  Lao  Hsi  Kai  affair  as  the  most 
Belgium-like  thing  that  has  happened  since 
the  invasion  of  Belgium.  Alike  in  principle,  if 
not  in  extent.  Whipped  up  into  a  white  heat 
of  fury,  it  draws,  over  and  over  again,  the  most 
disconcerting  parallels. 

And  all  this  week  it  has  continued  to  be  irri- 
tating, referring  constantly  to  Belgium,  and 
harping  upon  the  Allies'  ideals, — the  preserva- 
tion of  civilization,  liberty,  justice,  and  the 
rights  of  small,  weak  nations.  The  "Gazette" 
insists  that  these  ideals  should  be  applied 
to  China,  forgetting,  apparently,  that  while 
China  is  weak,  she  is  not  small! 

Meanwhile,  at  the  mass  meetings  which  are 
being  held  all  over  the  country,  especially  at 
Tientsin,  the  officials  are  trying  to  calm  the 
people.  It  is  feared  that  some  violent  action 
will  take  place,  some  hostile  demonstration 
against  the  French  which  will  throw  the  Chi- 
nese entirely  in  the  wrong,  no  matter  how 


96  PEKING  DUST 

great  the  provocation.  If  this  happens,  the 
sympathy  of  the  world  will  be  turned  against 
the  Chinese,  and  the  officials  are  striving  by  all 
means  to  prevent  such  an  outbreak.  A  quaint 
account  of  one  of  these  indignation  meetings 
was  published  in  one  of  the  Peking  papers : 

On  Saturday  morning  more  than  four  thousand 
merchants  and  inhabitants  of  Tientsin  gathered 
themselves  at  the  Chamber  of  Commerce  at  Tientsin, 
declaring  that  as  the  French  authorities  had  disre- 
garded international  law  and  principle,  they  would 
devise  means  themselves  for  the  preservation  of  their 
own  liberty  against  the  aggression  of  foreigners. 
The  Chairman  of  the  Chamber  came  out  with  the 
representatives  of  the  Society  for  the  Preservation 
of  National  Territory  to  appease  the  indignation  of 
the  public,  and  to  persuade  them  not  to  resort  to  vio- 
lence, but  to  seek  a  constitutional  method  to  arrive 
at  a  peaceful  solution  through  the  proper  channels. 
He  at  once  proceeded  with  the  people  to  the  office  of 
the  Shengcheng,  who  said,  "The  Frenchmen  are  in- 
deed most  aggressive  and  unreasonable.  Your  hum- 
ble servant  is  ready  to  sacrifice  position,  rank,  even 
life  itself,  for  the  preservation  of  the  territory  of  the 
nation.  A  telegram  has  already  been  sent  to  the 
Central  Government  giving  a  detailed  report  of  what 
has  happened  here,  and  a  reply  will  soon  be  received 
giving  instructions  for  our  guidance."  The  Chair- 


THE  LAO-HSI-KAI  OUTRAGE     97 

man  of  the  Chamber  of  Commerce  replied:  "I  am 
afraid  that  the  people  are  out  of  patience  now,  and 
there  are  several  thousands  of  merchants  and  other 
classes  of  people  awaiting  instruction,  outside  your 
office.  It  would  be  advisable  for  you  to  come  out 
and  pacify  them,  informing  them  what  you  would 
do."  When  the  Shengcheng  came  out,  the  audience 
clapped  their  hands  and  shouted  at  the  top  of  their 
voice.  Some  even  wept,  and  others  cried  "Liberty 
or  Death"  and  suchlike  expressions.  The  Sheng- 
cheng said:  "I  am  also  of  your  opinion.  I  will 
sacrifice  my  life,  too,  for  the  maintenance  of  the  ter- 
ritory entrusted  to  me  for  preservation.  And  I  can 
assure  you  that  no  foreigner  shall  be  allowed  to  oc- 
cupy one  inch  of  our  territory  in  this  unreasonable 
manner." 

It  is  pitiful  to  read  these  accounts  and  the 
telegrams  sent  to  the  President  of  China  and 
to  Parliament,  and  to  realize  that  the  weak  and 
cowed  government  at  Peking  cannot  defend  it- 
self against  the  foreign  aggressor.  However, 
the  Chinese  people  have  taken  affairs  into  their 
own  hands,  to  a  certain  extent,  and  have  organ- 
ized a  run  on  the  French  hank,  the  Banque  In- 
dustrielle  de  Chine.  One  of  the  branches  of 
this  bank  is  around  the  corner  from  the  hotel, 


98  PEKING  DUST 

and  all  day  long,  for  the  past  several  days,  a 
long,  patient  line  of  Chinese  have  been  stand- 
ing, waiting  to  withdraw  their  accounts  from 
the  bank  of  the  country  which  has  treated  them 
so  ill.  This  run  on  the  bank,  conducted  by  a 
huge  crowd  of  quiet,  orderly  men  and  women, 
is  a  favorite  Chinese  method  of  retaliation. 
They  say  the  bank  is  losing  enormous  sums  in 
consequence,  is  obliged  to  buy  great  quantities 
of  silver  to  maintain  its  credit.  Also,  there  are 
rumors  flying  about  that  a  boycott  of  French 
goods  is  shortly  to  be  established. 

The  attitude  of  the  English  newspapers 
(those  that  represent  the  foreign  point  of 
view)  is  illuminating.  They  are  laying  all 
these  manifestations  of  resentment  to  "agita- 
tors," refusing  to  believe  in  the  indignation  of 
the  people  themselves.  Every  day  the  news- 
papers representing  the  foreign  interests  are 
becoming  more  and  more  abusive.  Here  is 
one  extract  that  seems  particularly  insulting: 

The  Chinese  agitator,  particularly  if  he  believes 
that  he  enjoys  official  support,  is  invariably  willing 
to  fight  to  the  death  for  some  cause  that  he  professes 


THE  LAO-HSI-KAI  OUTRAGE     99 

to  have  at  heart,  until  there  is  some  risk  that  he  may 
be  taken  at  his  word.  Then  he  invariably  beats  an 
ignominious  retreat.  And  unless  we  are  greatly  mis- 
taken, this  is  what  will  happen  in  this  case.  We  are 
familiar  with  the  normal  course  of  events — public 
and  press  clamor,  attempts  to  institute  a  boycott, 
and  finally,  when  the  Power  whose  interests  are  af- 
fected, intimates  that  it  has  had  enough  of  this  tom- 
foolery— collapse  of  the  whole  agitation.  ...  If 
the  French  Legation,  after  allowing  sufficient  time 
for  the  self-styled  patriots  to  let  off  steam,  intimates 
that  this  nonsense  has  got  to  cease,  the  great  crusade 
for  the  protection  of  China's  sovereign  rights  over 
fifteen  hundred  mow  [three  hundred  and  thirty-three 
acres]  of  land  formally  promised  to  the  French  au- 
thorities several  months  ago,  will  collapse  as  sud- 
denly as  it  began.  Whenever  a  crisis  in  China's  for- 
eign affairs  occurs,  we  are  treated  in  the  Chinese 
press  to  humorous  dissertations  about  Chinese  dig- 
nity and  self-respect.  How  such  things  can  exist, 
even  in  the  Chinese  imagination,  at  the  present  mo- 
ment, passes  comprehension.  The  China  of  to-day 
cannot  seriously  expect  much  respect  or  considera- 
tion for  her  dignity  from  foreign  states,  because  these 
things  are  only  accorded  to  nations  that  are  worthy 
of  them. 

Read  this  paragraph  over  and  ponder  it  well. 
It  appeared  in  an  English  newspaper,  the  semi- 


100  PEKING  DUST 

official  organ  of  the  European  point  of  view. 
There  is  nothing  veiled  or  hidden  in  the  atti- 
tude of  the  dominant  race! 


XII 

THE  LAO-HSI-KAI   AFFAIR 

ANOTHER  week  has  gone  by,  the  atmos- 
phere is  still  tense  and  surcharged  with 
feeling,  and  the  situation  remains  unaltered. 
However,  the  newspapers  have  changed  their 
headings  from  "Outrage"  to  "Affair,"  al- 
though they  are  still  devoting  columns  and  col- 
umns to  the  matter.  Protest  meetings  are  still 
being  held,  and  the  run  on  the  French  bank 
must  have  been  pretty  successful,  from  the  Chi- 
nese point  of  view,  for  there  is  now  talk  of  an 
indemnity  for  the  damage  done!  Listen! 

Already  Threats  of  Indemnity.  The  French  Con- 
sul at  Tientsin  is  already  threatening  to  demand 
damages.  He  contends  that  the  Tientsin  people 
should  not  be  allowed  to  hold  a  meeting  of  protest 
against  what  is  clearly  an  outrage  on  the  integrity 
of  China.  He  says  the  Chinese  authorities  are  guilty 
of  the  "violation  of  treaty  rights"  and  therefore  must 
be  held  responsible  for  any  damage  done  to  French 

101 


102  PEKING  DUST 

commerce.  The  French  Consul  also  objected  to  the 
presence  of  officials  [Chinese]  at  the  meeting,  but 
omitted  to  state  that  the  local  officials  did  their  best 
to  calm  the  people  and  persuade  them  to  wait  pa- 
tiently for  the  decision  of  the  Government. 

Well,  I  have  always  wondered  how  it  was 
that  poor  old  China  is  forever  paying  indemni- 
ties, first  to  one  country,  then  to  another;  I 
have  never  known  how  it  came  about.  Pretty 
easy,  come  to  think  of  it!  First  grab  a  piece 
of  Chinese  soil,  then  suppress  all  protests  by 
levying  an  indemnity. 

The  "Gazette"  seems  to  have  gone  too  far  in 
its  championship  of  China,  and  has  got  into 
trouble.  Almost  from  the  beginning  the 
editor  has  insisted  that  the  French  Government 
itself  was  not  to  blame  for  this  affair.  He  has 
asserted  repeatedly  that  this  high-handed  pro- 
cedure was  the  individual  action  of  the  French 
consul-general.  As  far  as  I  can  see,  these  lit- 
tle "affairs"  always  take  place  in  the  absence 
of  the  minister, — a  well-timed  vacation,  during 
which  an  irresponsible  charge  d'affaires  acts 
on  his  own  initiative.  Be  that  as  it  may,  on 


THE  LAO-HSI-KAI  AFFAIR     103 

this  occasion  the  French  minister  happens  to 
be  in  Paris,  and  the  "Gazette"  is  insisting  that 
the  charge  d'affaires  has  exceeded  his  authority 
and  acted  without  instructions.  Apparently 
this  interpretation  is  given  partly  because  of  a 
desire  not  to  involve  the  two  governments  in  a 
hopeless  snarl  admitting  of  no  retreat,  and 
partly  to  calm  the  rising  anger  of  the  Chinese, 
who  are  incensed  at  the  delay  in  restoring  the 
captured  land.  While  stoutly  refusing  to  re- 
tire from  its  position  as  the  champion  of  Chi- 
nese liberty  and  territory,  the  "Gazette""  is  in- 
sistent that  this  act  could  not  have  been  com- 
mitted at  the  instigation  of  a  country  at  present 
fighting  for  liberty  and  justice,  a  great  nation 
pledged  to  noble  ideals. 

Whether  this  attitude  has  been  due  to  a  sin- 
cere belief  in  the  Allies'  professed  ideals,  or 
whether  by  the  fixing  of  blame  on  an  irrespon- 
sible official  who  has  exceeded  his  authority,  the 
French  are  being  offered  a  loophole  to  retreat 
from  an  intenable  position  without  "losing 
face,"  I  don't  know.  Certain  it  is  that  "jus- 
tice, liberty,  and  civilization"  have  been 


104  PEKING  DUST 

dragged  into  the  argument,  day  after  day,  with 
irritating  persistency.  Really,  the  Oriental 
mind,  plus  contact  with  a  higher  civilization, 
was  becoming  unbearable.  So  a  stop  was  put 
to  it  in  this  way:  One  morning  the  papers 
contained  an  announcement  that  "The  Allied 
and  neutral  ministers  despatched  an  identical 
note  to  the  Chinese  Foreign  Office,  warning  the 
Chinese  Government  against  allowing  the  Chi- 
nese press  to  attack  the  diplomatic  body  in  the 
way  it  had  lately  done,  and  practically  de- 
manding that  the  Government  take  some  steps 

• 

to  prevent  the  attempted  raising  of  anti-for- 
eign feeling." 

Isn't  it  lucky  we  are  here  at  this  moment! 
Could  you  believe  it !  Now  you  know  how  "in- 
demnities" are  raised,  and  how  "anti-foreign 
feeling"  is  aroused.  A  day  or  two  afterward, 
a  further  pronouncement  was  made: 

Comments  in  the  Chinese  press  have  been  rather 
rude  and  sharp,  so  that  the  Ministry  [Chinese]  has 
been  requested  by  the  British,  Russian,  French  and 
Japanese  and  other  foreign  governments  to  caution 
the  editors  and  proprietors  of  Chinese  papers  to 


THE  LAO-HSI-KAI  AFFAIR    105 

exercise  more  care  and  discretion  in  their  recording 
of  foreign  intercourse  affairs,  and  that  sufficient  po- 
liteness should  be  showed  to  foreign  ministers  and 
consuls  as  a  sign  of  courtesy  toward  the  representa- 
tives of  Treaty  Powers  in  this  country. 

There  you  have  it — the  Chinese  press  muz- 
zled at  the  instigation  of  foreign  powers! 
Since  that  happened  a  few  days  ago,  I  have  n't 
got  nearly  as  much  fun  out  of  my  "Gazette" 
in  the  morning  when  I  have  had  my  "pollidge." 
But,  thank  Heaven,  the  English  newspapers, 
representing  the  interests  of  the  foreign  pow- 
ers, are  able  to  spout  freely.  And  these  pa- 
pers have  been  having  a  wonderful  time  de- 
scribing the  happenings  in  Tientsin,  where  the 
threatened  boycott  has  gone  into  effect.  For 
the  Chinese,  baffled  in  their  attempt  to  regain 
their  captured  territory,  have  instituted  what 
they  call  that  "revenge  which  must  take  the 
form  of  civilized  retaliation,  namely,  refusal  to 
buy  or  sell  French  goods."  On  an  appointed 
day  there  was  a  general  walk-out  in  the  French 
concession  in  Tientsin.  All  the  Chinese  in 
French  employ — house  servants,  waiters,  elec- 


106  PEKING  DUST 

tricians  in  the  power-houses,  stall-holders  in  the 
markets,  policemen,  every  one  in  any  way  con- 
nected with  or  in  French  service — took  them- 
selves off.  Moving-picture  shows  are  in  dark- 
ness ;  interpreters  and  clerks  in  banks  and  com- 
mercial houses  have  disappeared ;  cooks,  coolies 
and  coachmen  have  departed;  and  life  in  the 
whole  French  concession  is  entirely  disorgan- 
ized !  The  French  consul-general  sent  a  letter 
of  protest  to  the  Chinese  Commissioner  of  For- 
eign Affairs,  calling  for  "strict  preventive 
measures  on  the  part  of  the  Chinese  authori- 
ties," and  the  answer  of  the  Commissioner,  the 
prompt  and  polite  reply,  was  to  the  effect  that 
the  only  preventive  measure  for  these  disturb- 
ances would  be  to  hand  Lao  Hsi  Kai  back  to 
the  Chinese! 

How  demoralizing  this  boycott  is  may  be 
gathered  from  the  way  the  foreign  press  is 
raging  about  it.  One  bitter  editorial,  entitled, 
"A  Plain  Talk  to  the  Chinese,"  has  this  to  say: 

Boycotts  and  strikes,  in  lieu  of  diplomatic  action, 
are  becoming  somewhat  of  a  fad  with  the  Chinese. 
They  have  been  practised  with  impunity  and  consid- 


THE  LAO-HSI-KAI  AFFAIR     107 

erable  success  for  the  past  fifteen  or  twenty  years. 
.  .  .  We  wish  to  impress  upon  the  Chinese  people 
and  Government  that  these  anti-foreign  agitations 
are  becoming  somewhat  of  a  nuisance,  and  it  is  high 
time  the  foreign  powers  stepped  in  and  put  a  stop  to 
them.  .  .  .  The  foreign  powers  have  no  means  of 
getting  directly  after  this  handful  of  agitators,  but 
they  have  the  means  and  the  power — the  will  only  is 
necessary — to  hold  the  Chinese  Government  responsi- 
ble, and  to  demand  satisfaction  in  full  for  all  losses 
suffered  by  firms  and  individuals  as  a  result  of  these 
organized  boycotts.  We  wish  to  warn  the  Chinese 
that  this  boycott  business  can  be  carried  out  once 
too  often,  and  it  looks  to  us  that  they  have  just  now 
reached  this  once-too-often  stage.  If  the  French 
Government,  backed  up  by  the  Allies,  demands  in- 
demnity for  all  losses  sustained,  we  will  hear  the  last 
of  Lao  Hsi  Kai  and  all  similar  affairs  in  China.  It 
may  be  just  as  well  to  remind  the  Chinese  Govern- 
ment, in  case  they  conclude  that  the  Allies  are  too 
busy  in  Europe  to  pay  serious  attention  to  Chinese 
affairs,  that  the  Japanese  are  one  of  the  Allies,  and 
their  hands  are  not  particularly  tied  at  present. 

Good  gracious !     A  threat  to  call  in  the  Jap- 
anese!   Don't  you  love  it! 


XIII 

THE  LAO-HSI-KAI   "INCIDENT** 

IT  'S  about  over,  I  should  say.  The  French 
are  going  to  keep  their  ill-gotten  gains, 
and  the  Chinese  are  giving  up  all'  hope  of  get- 
ting Lao  Hsi  Kai  back  again.  The  thing  has 
drifted  from  an  "Outrage"  into  an  "Affair" 
and  now  it 's  only  an  "Incident,"  which  means 
it 's  over.  The  boycott  continues,  but  it  is 
dwindling  in  intensity  and  will  soon  subside. 
It  is  now  but  a  question  of  time  before  China 
settles  down  to  an  acceptance  of  the  situation, 
bows  before  the  might  and  majesty  of  Western 
civilization,  and  prepares  herself  for  the  next 
outcropping  of  kindred  ideals. 

You  ask,  why  did  n't  the  Chinese  fight? 
"What  with,  stupid  Gretchen?"  How  can  a 
virtually  bankrupt  nation  like  China  take  up 
arms,  which  she  doesn't  possess,  against  the 
mighty  nations  of  Europe?  Defenseless,  un- 

108 


LAO-HSI-KAI  "INCIDENT"     109 

armed  China  is  no  match  for  the  "civilization" 
of  the  West! 

A  few  nights  ago  I  got  a  French  point  of 
view  of  the  affair,  and  will  give  it  to  you  just 
as  I  heard  it,  without  comment.  One  of  the 
attaches  of  the  French  legation  was  dining 
with  us.  This  Lao  Hsi  Kai  business,  which 
has  been  uppermost  in  every  one's  thoughts  for 
the  last  four  weeks,  was  naturally  in  our  minds 
as  we  sat  down  at  dinner.  Not  to  mention  it 
would  have  savored  of  constraint;  yet  it  was 
equally  embarrassing  to  speak  of  it.  After 
ten  or  fifteen  minutes,  during  which  the  sub- 
ject was  carefully  avoided,  I  took  the  bull  by 
the  horns. 

"Seems  to  me  you  Ve  stirred  up  a  great  mess 
out  here,"  I  began. 

"Mess?"  replied  the  young  Frenchman. 
"Oh,  you  mean  that  affair  of  the  other  day! 
Ah,  these  Chinese !  Perfectly  impossible  peo- 
ple!" 

He  crumbled  his  bread  a  while,  and  then  con- 
tinued with  much  heat. 

"For  fourteen  years,"  he  burst  out,  "we  have 


110  PEKING  DUST 

been  wanting  that  piece  of  land,  and  asking  for 
it!  Asked  them  for  it  fourteen  years  ago! 
Told  them  fourteen  years  ago  that  we  wanted 
it! 

"And  what  did  they  do?"  he  went  on  irri- 
tably. "What  did  they  do  but  procrastinate, 
knowing  we  wanted  it!  Put  us  off.  Post- 
poned a  decision.  Practically  refused  to  give 
it  to  us,  knowing  we  wanted  it!  Other  things 
came  up  in  the  meantime,  so  we  did  not  press 
them,  and  the  matter  dropped  for  a  number 
of  years.  However,  we  took  it  up  again  in' 
1914,  two  years  ago.  It  was  the  same  thing — 
procrastination;  delay;  no  positive  answer. 
Then  we  pressed  them  a  little  harder.  What 
did  they  do?  Asked  for  more  time  to  think  it 
over,  more  time  after  all  these  years,  knowing 
we  wanted  it!  Knowing  that  we  had  asked 
for  it  fourteen  years  ago,  as  far  back  as  1902 ! 
Knowing  that  we  had  asked  for  it  as  far  back 
as  1902,  they  still  had  the  audacity  to  ask  for 
more  time  to  think  it  over! 

"However,"  he  resumed,  "we  gave  them 
more  time.  They  asked  for  a  year.  We  gave 


LAO-HSI-KAI  "INCIDENT"     111 

them  a  year.  When  the  year  was  up,  they 
asked  for  six  months.  We  gave  them  six 
months.  When  the  six  months  were  up,  they 
asked  for  three  months.  We  gave  them  three 
months.  We  were  most  reasonable  and  pa- 
tient. When  the  three  months  were  up,  they 
asked  for  one  month.  We  had  infinite  pa- 
tience. When  the  one  month  was  up,  they 
asked  for  two  weeks.  We  gave  them  two 
weeks.  We  had  infinite  forbearance.  Think 
of  it!  Naturally,  at  the  end  of  two  weeks, 
when  they  still  had  not  made  up  their  minds, 
we  took  it.  What  else  could  we  have  done? 
We  had  given  them  every  opportunity,  for 
fourteen  years.  Ah,  these  Chinese!  They 
are  impossible.  No  one  can  understand 
them!" 

We  are  going  to  leave  Peking  within  a  day 
or  two  and  go  down  to  the  tropics  for  the  win- 
ter. This  is  the  end  of  November  and  it  is 
getting  bitterly  cold,  and  with  the  on-coming 
of  cold  weather  we  seem  to  have  reverted  sud- 
denly to  our  original  plan  of  visiting  Angkor. 
So  you  will  get  no  more  Chinese  letters  from 


112  PEKING  DUST 

me  until  the  spring,  when  we  are  planning  to 
return  to  Peking.  It  has  all  been  most  ex- 
citing, most  interesting,  but  we  are  thoroughly 
tired  out  with  having  our  sympathies  so  played 
upon,  so  wrought  up,  and  feeling  ourselves 
impotent.  It  is  distressing  to  stand  by  and 
see  such  things  transpire  under  our  very  eyes, 
injustices  which  we  are  powerless  to  prevent. 
I  shall  be  anxious  to  know  whether  anything 
of  this  affair  has  crept  into  our  American  pa- 
pers. I  suppose  not,  however.  We  are  anx- 
ious only  to  see  "civilization"  triumph  in  Eu- 
rope. The  backwash  of  civilization  in  the 
Orient  is  not  our  concern.  All  I  can  say  is 
this:  The  world  would  have  rung  with  news 
of  such  a  grab  if  Japan  had  been  guilty  of  it. 


PART  II 


I 

THE   RETURN   TO   PEKING 

WE  have  been  away  now  for  three 
months,  and  it  seems  like  getting 
home,  to  be  back  in  our  beloved  Peking.  We 
reached  the  shabby  old  station,  the  other  eve- 
ning, worn  out  from  the  long  two-days'  jour- 
ney up  from  Shanghai,  and  it  was  good  to  have 
the  porter  from  the  Wagons-Lits  greet  us  and 
welcome  us  like  old  friends.  It  was  pleasant 
to  walk  back  along  the  long  platform  of  the 
station,  under  the  Water  Gate,  and  to  find 
ourselves,  in  a  minute  or  two,  in  the  warm, 
bright  lobby  of  this  precious  hotel.  The  door- 
keeper knew  us;  the  clerks  at  the  desk  knew 
us ;  and  the  various  "boys,"  both  in  the  dining- 
room  and  up-stairs  in  our  corridor,  all  knew  us 
and  greeted  us  with  what  seemed  to  our  tired 
souls  real  and  satisfying  cordiality.  "Missy 

115 


116  PEKING  DUST 

way  long  time.  Glad  Missy  back,"  "Missy 
like  Peking  best  ?"  And  Missy  certainly  does. 
Moreover,  if  you  have  once  lived  in  Peking,  if 
you  have  ever  stayed  here  long  enough  to  fall 
under  the  charm  and  interest  of  this  splendid 
barbaric  capital,  if  you  have  once  seen  the  tem- 
ples and  glorious  monuments  of  Chili,  all 
other  parts  of  China  seem  dull  and  second 
rate.  We  began  here,  you  see.  If  we  had 
begun  at  the  other  end, — landed  at  Shanghai, 
for  instance,  and  worked  our  way  northward,— 
we  should  probably  have  been  enthusiastic  over 
the  lesser  towns.  But  we  began  at  the  top; 
and  when  you  have  seen  the  best  there  is,  every- 
thing else  is  anticlimax. 

We  arrived  the  other  evening  in  a  tremen- 
dous dust-storm,  the  first  real  dust-storm  we 
have  experienced.  We  ran  into  it  at  Tientsin, 
where  we  changed  trains  to  continue  the  last 
two  hours  of  our  journey  north,  and  were  un- 
comfortable beyond  description.  The  Tien- 
tsin train  was  absolutely  unheated,  cold  as  a 
barn.  The  piercing  wind  from  the  plains 
penetrated  every  nook  and  crevice  of  the  car- 


THE  RETURN  TO  PEKING    117j 

riage,  and  the  cracks  were  legion :  the  windows 
leaked,  the  closed  ventilators  overhead  leaked, 
the  doors  at  each  end  of  the  carriage  leaked, 
and  we  wrapped  ourselves  in  our  ulsters  and 
traveling-rugs  and  sat  huddled  up,  miserable 
and  shivering.  But  it  was  n't  wind  alone  that 
blew  in  through  the  numerous  holes.  There 
was  wind,  of  course,  in  plenty,  but  it  carried  in 
it  a  soft,  powdery  red  dust,  a  fine,  thin  dust, 
able  as  the  wind  that  bore  it  to  sift  through 
every  crack  and  opening.  It  filled  the  car- 
riage, it  filled  the  compartment,  and  when  the 
lamps  were  lit  we  sat  as  in  a  fog,  dimly  able 
to  see  each  other  through  the  thick,  hazy  at- 
mosphere. There  we  sat,  coughing  and  sput- 
tering, breathing  dust  into  ourselves  at  every 
breath,  unable  to  escape.  We  became  covered 
with  it;  it  piled  itself  upon  us  in  little  ridges 
and  piles ;  no  one  moved  much,  for  that  shook 
it  off  into  the  surcharged  air,  already  thick 
enough,  Heaven  knows. 

Two  hours  of  this,  bitter  cold  and  insuffer- 
able, choking  dust.  And  every  one  in  the 
crowded  compartment  was  suffering  from  Chi- 


118  PEKING  DUST 

nese  colds;  we  had  them  too,  contracted  at 
Shanghai.  And  let  me  tell  you  that  a  Chinese 
cold  is  something  out  of  the  ordinary.  What- 
ever happens  here  happens  on  a  grand  scale, 
and  these  colds,  whatever  the  germ  that  causes 
them,  are  more  venomous  than  anything 
you  've  ever  known.  No  wonder  the  railway 
station  looked  good  to  us ;  no  wonder  we  were 
glad  to  be  welcomed  back  to  the  old  hotel,  at 
the  end  of  such  a  journey! 

We  found  plenty  of  hot  water  when  we  got 
here.  Not  that  hot  water  does  one  much  good 
in  Peking.  For  Peking  water  is  hard  and 
alkaline,  and  about  as  difficult  to  wash  in  as 
sea-water,  if  one  uses  soap ;  we  are  dirty  despite 
all  the  facilities  afforded  us.  I  should  say 
that  the  Chinese  had  given  up  the  struggle  sev- 
eral generations  ago ;  and  small  blame  to  them. 
We  reached  here  the  last  day  of  February,  and 
are  now  experiencing  a  taste  of  real  Northern 
winter,  just  the  tail  of  it  but  sufficient.  Com- 
ing up  from  the  Equator,  as  we  have  done,  the 
shock  is  rather  awful.  This  winter,  they  say, 
has  been  an  extraordinarily  severe  one,  even 


THE  RETURN  TO  PEKING    119 

for  Peking,  where  it  is  always  cold ;  they  tell  us 
it  has  been  the  coldest  winter  within  the  mem- 
ory of  the  oldest  foreign  resident.  I  don't 
believe  much  in  these  superlative  statements, 
however:  people  always  make  them  concern- 
ing hot  or  cold  weather,  in  any  climate  or 
in  any  country.  However,  the  thermometer 
went  so  low  on  several  occasions  that  the  pipes 
burst,  and  the  hotel  was  without  heat;  very 
trying  with  the  weather  at  twenty  below  zero. 
Nevertheless,  in  spite  of  the  lingering  cold,  in 
spite  of  the  dust,  in  spite  of  the  hard  water 
and  other  discomforts,  Peking  is  the  most  de- 
lightful place  in  the  world,  not  even  except- 
ing Paris,  than  which,  as  an  American,  I  can 
say  no  more. 

We  have  been  here  a  week  now,  have  re- 
covered from  our  Chinese  colds,  and  are  get- 
ting hold  of  things  again.  We  are  catching 
up  with  all  the  gossip,  all  the  rumors,  all  the 
dessous  of  Chinese  politics,  which  are  such  fun. 
And  just  as  I  expected,  too,  it  was  n't  safe 
for  us  to  go  away,  to  leave  China  to  flounder 
along  without  us.  Things  have  happened  in 


120  PEKING  DUST 

our  absence:  I  won't  say  that  we  could  have 
prevented  them,  but  at  least  we  could  have 
been  on  the  spot  to  take  notes.  That  is  what 
makes  Peking  so  absorbing, — the  peculiar  pro- 
tective feeling  that  it  gives  one.  In  a  way  it 
seems  to  belong  to  us;  its  interests  are  our  in- 
terests ;  its  well-being  is  peculiarly  our  concern. 
You  wish  the  best  to  happen  to  China,  you 
wish  Chinese  interests  to  have  the  right  of  way. 
And  whatever  you  can  do  to  promote  such  in- 
terests, however  small  and  humble  your  part 
may  be  in  advancing  them,  it  is  your  part 
nevertheless,  and  the  obligation  to  fulfil  it  rests 
upon  you  with  overwhelming  insistence.  As 
I  told  you  before,  China  is  overrun  with  "ad- 
visers." Consequently  we  all  feel  ourselves 
"advisers,"  more  or  less,  all  capable  of  giving 
advice  just  as  worthless  or  just  as  valuable 
as,  certainly  more  disinterested  than,  that 
which  the  Chinese  Government  is  compelled  to 
pay  for.  Everything  is  in  such  a  mess  here — 
so  anarchic,  so  chaotic — that  you  feel  you  must 
put  out  a  hand  to  steady  this  rocking  old  edi- 
fice; and  you  also  feel  that  your  hand  is  as 


THE  RETURN  TO  PEKING    121 

strong,  and  probably  as  honest,  as  the  next 
one. 

In  no  other  country  that  I  know  of  do  you 
feel  so  keenly  this  sense  of  possession,  this 
wish  to  protect.  The  other  countries  be  bug 
to  themselves,  absolutely.  For  example, 
Japan  owns  itself  and  directs  itself ;  the  Japa- 
nese don't  let  you  know  much  about  what 's 
going  on  in  their  country ;  and  you  feel  that  it 
is  none  of  your  business  anyway.  They  are 
quite  capable  of  managing  their  own  affairs. 
So  in  Europe :  the  affairs  of  the  European  peo- 
ples are  their  affairs,  not  your  concern  at  all. 
But  the  case  is  so  different  with  poor,  weak, 
helpless  China.  China  enlists  all  your  sym- 
pathies, calls  forth  every  decent  instinct  you 
possess. 

For  these  are  dark,  distressful  days  for 
China.  At  present  she  is  passing  through  a 
reconstruction  period  corresponding  to  our  re- 
construction period  after  the  Civil  War.  Just 
five  years  ago  the  revolution  occurred  by 
which  she  rid  herself  of  the  Manchu  rulers,  an 
alien  race  which  had  dominated  her  and  ruled 


122  PEKING  DUST 

her  for  two  hundred  years.  And  chaos  fol- 
lowed that  upheaval,  just  as  political  chaos  fol- 
lowed the  close  of  our  Civil  War.  We,  how- 
ever, were  free  to  work  our  way  upward  and 
outward  from  the  difficulties  that  beset  us  at 
that  time,  out  of  the  maze  of  corruption  and 
intrigue  that  almost  overwhelmed  us.  We 
were  permitted  to  manage  our  own  affairs,  to 
bring  order  out  of  that  chaos,  harmony  out  of 
strife,  without  having  to  deal  with  foreign 
predatory  powers  who  for  their  own  ends  were 
anxious  to  prolong  the  period  of  internal  dis- 
sension. China  is  not  free  in  that  respect: 
not  only  must  she  set  her  house  in  order,  but 
she  must  deal  with  those  foreign  powers  who 
do  not  wish  her  house  in  order,  who  are  slily 
and  adroitly  using  their  enormous,  subtle  in- 
fluence to  defeat  this  end.  During  our  re- 
construction period  in  America  we  made  mis- 
takes ;  but  after  those  mistakes  we  did  not  have 
to  hear  a  chorus  from  European  nations  telling 
us  that  we  were  unfit  to  govern  ourselves. 
Nor  were  we  forced  to  have  other  nations  try- 
ing to  corrupt  every  honest  man  we  wished  to 


THE  RETURN  TO  PEKING    123 

put  in  office,  nor  to  have  these  alien  nations 
attempting  to  put  into  power  dishonest  and 
inefficient  men  as  their  own  tools.  That  is 
China's  problem  at  present:  not  only  must 
she  contend  against  the  inherent  weakness  and 
dishonesty,  the  inefficiency  and  graft  of  her 
own  people,  but  she  must  contend  against  un- 
seen, suave  enemies,  who  under  diplomatic  dis- 
guise are  intriguing  to  bring  the  nation  under 
foreign  control. 

I  have  not  been  able  to  get  much  definite 
news  so  far.  Our  Chinese  colds  proved  so 
severe  that  they  were  nearly  our  undoing.  I 
fancied  myself  reposing  under  a  little  mound 
on  the  plains,  after  an  imposing  Chinese 
funeral.  I  must  say  I  should  have  enjoyed  a 
Chinese  funeral,  with  drums  and  horns,  flags 
and  banners,  carried  along  in  a  car  supported 
by  three  score  bearers.  But  for  the  present 
it 's  not  to  be. 


II 

THE   OPIUM    SCANDAL 

I  KNEW  it  would  happen.  I  knew  that 
if  we  went  away  from  Peking  for  even 
a  short  time,  let  alone  for  three  months,  some- 
thing would  take  place  that  ought  n't  to.  The 
minute  you  turn  your  head  the  other  way,  take 
your  hand  off  the  throttle,  pop  goes  the  weasel ! 
It 's  popped  this  time  with  an  awful  bang. 
The  papers  are  full  of  it,  pages  and  pages,  the 
entire  paper,  and  not  only  one  or  two  but  all 
of  them.  You  have  probably  not  been  per- 
mitted to  hear  a  word  of  it  at  home,  but  the 
Chinese  papers  are  allowed  to  explode  all  they 
please,  to  rail  and  rave  and  rant.  As  I  said 
before,  much  good  may  it  do  them. 

I  wrote  you  last  autumn  of  the  ten-year 
contract  entered  into  between  China  and  the 
British  Government,  the  final  outcome  of  the 
contract  to  be  the  total  suppression  of  the 

124 


THE  OPIUM  SCANDAL        125 

opium  trade.  Every  year  for  ten  years  the 
importation  of  British  opium  into  China  was 
to  decrease  in  proportion  to  the  decrease  of 
native-grown  Chinese  opium,  until  at  the  ex- 
piration of  the  ten  years  the  vanishing-point 
would  be  reached.  During  these  ten  years 
each  side  has  lived  up  to  its  part  of  the  bargain. 
British  imports  have  been  lessened  year  by 
year,  scrupulously,  and  the  Chinese  have  rig- 
idly supervised  and  suppressed  the  production 
of  native  opium.  China  began  to  plant  pop- 
pies extensively  after  1858,  the  year  in  which 
Great  Britain  forced  the  opium  trade  upon 
her. 

The  ten-year  contract  was  to  expire  on 
April  1,  1917,  a  day  which  the  Chinese  press 
referred  to  as  "a  glorious  day  for  China  and 
her  well-wishers  throughout  the  world,  a  day 
on  which  a  nation  liberated  herself  from  an 
age-long  vice."  I  also  told  you  last  autumn 
something  of  the  activities  of  the  Shanghai 
Opium  Combine,  a  combination  of  several 
firms  of  British  opium-dealers,  who  were  mak- 
ing prodigious  efforts  to  have  the  time  limit 


126  PEKING  DUST 

extended.  This  Shanghai  Opium  Combine 
are  not  officials  of  the  British  Government: 
they  are  private  firms,  private  dealers;  but 
they  buy  their  opium  direct  from  the  British 
Government,  and  may  therefore  be  considered 
its  unofficial  agents  or  middlemen.  This 
Opium  Combine  had  been  appealing  for  an 
extension  of  the  ten-year  contract,  an  exten- 
sion of  nine  months.  They  had  appealed  to 
the  various  British  officials  in  China,  and  to 
the  Foreign  Office  in  London,  but  apparently 
the  British  Government  had  turned  a  deaf 
ear  to  these  pleas,  which  must  have  been  a 
hard  thing  to  do,  considering  the  enormous 
revenue  that  country  derives  from  her  opium 
monopoly.  Even  without  the  Chinese  mar- 
kets, one  would  have  supposed  that  the  mar- 
kets of  India,  Siam,  the  Straits  Settlements, 
etc.,  and  other  subject  or  helpless  states, 
would  afford  these  dealers  opportunity  to  get 
rid  of  their  surplus  stocks.  But  no.  The 
opium  was  in  China,  in  their  go-downs  in 
Shanghai,  and  they  wanted  nine  months'  ad- 
ditional time  in  which  to  get  rid  of  it. 


THE  OPIUM  SCANDAL       127 

If  this  time  extension  had  once  been  granted, 
however,  pressure  would  have  been  brought  to 
bear  at  the  end  of  the  nine  months  for  a  fur- 
ther extension;  and  so  on,  and  so  on,  upon 
various  pretexts.  Accordingly,  the  British 
Government  refused  to  interfere  in  the  matter, 
and  very  honorably  decided  that  the  opium 
traffic  in  China  was  to  end  on  the  date  speci- 
fied, April  1,  1917. 

But  what  did  the  Shanghai  Combine  do? 
Finding  they  could  not  sell  their  remaining 
chests  of  opium  before  the  first  of  April  (which 
they  could  easily  have  done  had  they  not  held 
them  at  such  exorbitant  prices),  they  appar- 
ently "influenced"  the  Vice-President  of  China 
to  purchase  them  in  behalf  of  the  Chinese  Gov- 
ernment !  There  were  some  three  thousand  of 
these  chests,  each  one  containing  about  a  hun- 
dred and  forty  pounds  of  opium,  and  the  sum 
which  the  Vice-President  pledged  China  to  pay 
for  this  opium  was  twenty  million  dollars. 
China  was  under  no  obligation  whatsoever  to 
purchase  this.  In  a  few  more  weeks  the  con- 
tract would  have  expired,  and  China  would 


128  PEKING  DUST 

have  been  automatically  freed.  The  Shanghai 
Combine  could  either  have  disposed  of  their 
chests  at  reasonable  prices  within  the  time 
limit,  or  else  hawked  them  round  to  other 
markets.  But,  the  Vice-President  having  been 
"influenced"  in  this  manner,  this  well-nigh 
bankrupt  country  is  now  about  to  issue  domes- 
tic bonds  to  the  value. of  twenty  million  dollars 
to  pay  for  this  indebtedness. 

This  secret  treaty,  this  dastardly  betrayal 
of  China  by  her  Vice-president  and  the  British 
opium-dealers,  is  apparently  a  one-man  deal. 
After  the  contract  between  them  was  signed, 
Parliament  and  the  country  at  large  was  noti- 
fied of  the  transaction,  and  once  more  the  coun- 
try is  ablaze  with  indignation.  Once  more 
mass  meetings  of  protest  are  being  held 
throughout  the  provinces ;  telegrams  from  gov- 
ernors and  officials  are  pouring  in;  the  con- 
tract is  denounced  and  repudiated  by  Parlia- 
ment; but  all  to  no  purpose.  This  infamous 
contract  holds  and  cannot  be  broken.  China 
must  pay  out  twenty  millions  of  dollars  for  this 
drug,  which  she  has  made  a  superhuman  strug- 


Courtooy  u.  Far  E-stern  Buieau 


Vice-President  Feng  Kuo-Chang 


L 


THE  OPIUM  SCANDAL        129 

gle  to  get  rid  of.  And  as  twenty  millions  is  a 
sum  far  in  excess  of  the  real  value  of  these  three 
thousand  chests,  the  papers  are  freely  hinting 
that  Baron  Feng  was  bribed. 

Feng's  excuse  is  that  he  was  obliged  to  con- 
clude this  deal  for  "diplomatic  reasons."  You 
can  draw  your  own  conclusions  as  to  what  that 
implies.  He  also  says  that  it  was  better  for 
China  to  buy  these  chests  outright  than  to  have 
them  smuggled  in  later.  Also  he  says  the 
Chinese  Government  can  now  sell  this  opium 
at  discretion,  in  small  amounts,  for  "medical 
purposes."  Legitimately  to  dispose  of  three 
thousand  chests  of  opium  for  medical  purposes, 
would  require  about  five  hundred  years. 

By  reason  of  this  infamous  deal  China  is 
now  faced  with  the  probable  resumption  of 
the  opium  traffic.  The  Chinese  Government 
has  become,  like  the  British  Government,  a 
dealer  in  opium.  It  must  dispose  of  this 
opium  either  for  "medical  purposes"  or  for 
smoking  purposes.  This  will  undoubtedly 
mean  that  poppy  cultivation  will  again  be  re- 
sumed. It  is  not  inconceivable  that  the  same 


130  PEKING  DUST 

sinister  pressure  which  was  brought  to  bear 
upon  the  Vice-president  may  also  be  brought 
to  bear  upon  planters  in  the  interior  provinces, 
should  they  be  unwilling,  which  is  unlikely,  to 
raise  once  more  these  profitable  crops.  And  if 
China  goes  back  to  poppy  cultivation,  Great 
Britain  may  feel  at  liberty  to  import  opium 
again.  If  that  happens,  the  whole  vicious 
circle  will  be  complete.  All  barriers  will  be 
down,  and  this  whole  long,  ten-years'  struggle 
will  have  been  in  vain. 

The  whole  country  is  shocked,  appalled,  dis- 
mayed. No  one  sees  any  way  out  of  this 
impasse.  One  suggestion  is  made  that  this 
opium  be  destroyed,  a  bonfire  made  of  it.  It 
would  be  a  costly  proceeding,  for  this  almost 
bankrupt  nation  cannot  afford  to  destroy 
twenty  million  dollars  with  a  wave  of  the  hand. 
We  can  only  wait  and  see  what  the  outcome 
will  be.  Only  once  can  a  drug-sodden  na- 
tion rise  to  grapple  with  such  a  habit  as  this. 
Only  once  can  a  nation  set  itself  such  a  colossal 
task.  The  fight  was  made  against  great  odds, 
under  a  tremendous  handicap.  But  it  was  car- 


THE  OPIUM  SCANDAL1       131 

ried  on  in  the  belief  that  at  the  end  of  ten 
years  the  fight  would  be  won.  If  betrayal 
is  to  be  the  outcome  of  such  a  mighty  effort, 
what  incentive  is  there  to  begin  again,  to  re- 
new the  struggle,  should  things  slip  back  to 
the  conditions  of  ten  years  ago?  The  coun- 
try is  overwhelmed  with  disappointment  and 
humiliation.  No  one  knows  what  the  future 
holds  in  store.  The  great  nations  of  the  world 
stand  silent,  in  this  hour  of  China's  betrayal.1 

i  See  Appendix  I. 


Ill 

THE  WALRUS  AND   THE   CARPENTER 

WE  have  got  back  to  China  just  in  time 
to  witness  another  interesting  event. 
The  decision  has  now  been  reached  that  the 
time  has  come  for  China  to  go  to  war.  She 
has  been  "notified"  to  this  effect.  What  she 
will  eventually  do  is  the  question.  Anyway, 
the  screws  are  now  being  put  on  in  earnest: 
you  can  fairly  hear  them  creaking. 

As  I  wrote  you  in  one  of  my  letters  last 
autumn,  ever  since  the  outbreak  of  the  war 
numerous  but  vain  efforts  have  been  made 
from  time  to  time  to  draw  China  in.  Induce- 
ments, of  various  kinds  have  been  offered  her 
during  these  last  two  years,  but  she  has  reso- 
lutely turned  a  deaf  ear  to  these  overtures  and 
remained  neutral.  But  the  time  has  now  come 
when  her  resources  and  her  man  power  are 
needed;  consequently  the  screws  are  turning 

132 


WALRUS  AND  CARPENTER     133 

gently  but  relentlessly,  and  China  is  being 
crowded  along  into  a  realization  of  her  duty 
toward  civilization. 

Wilson's  note  to  China,  asking  her  to  break 
off  diplomatic  relations  with  Germany,  was 
similar  to  the  notes  he  despatched  to  the  other 
neutral  countries,  asking  them  to  do  the  same 
thing.  In  the  case  of  China,  however,  it  gives 
the  Allies  the  opportunity  they  have  been  look- 
ing for,  and  they  have  all  sprung  forward  in  a 
chorus  of  endorsement.  They  have  been  un- 
able, for  obvious  reasons,  to  make  much  of  an 
appeal  on  the  score  of  high  morality:  the 
Orient  is  not  quite  the  ground  in  which  to  sow 
seed  of  that  kind,  especially  after  Lao  Hsi  Kai 
and  the  recent  opium  deal.  But  America's 
record  in  the  Far  East  is  well-nigh  irreproach- 
able, and  when  we  ask  China  to  join  with  us— 

So  the  papers  are  discussing  the  question 
back  and  forth,  from  every  angle,  for  and 
against,  with  every  shade  of  frankness,  bitter- 
ness, enthusiasm,  and  doubt.  There  are  those 
who  would  trust  America  utterly:  we  have  al- 
ways been  China's  friend,  sincerely  and  disin- 


134  PEKING  DUST 

terestedly;  we  would  not  lure  her  into  a  dis- 
astrous adventure.  There  are  others  who  dis- 
trust the  predatory  powers,  and  who  are 
frankly  puzzled  at  our  joining  them.  They 
question  our  motives.  Are  we  going  to  pull 
them  up  to  our  level,  to  our  high  idealism,  or 
are  we  going  to  sink  to  theirs?  The  Oriental 
mind  is  an  old,  old  mind,  richly  stored  with 
experience  and  memories, — not  in  the  least 
gullible  and  immature.  Therefore,  they  very 
earnestly  desire  to  know.  America  has  never 
deceived  them,  never  played  them  false.  But 
— but — what  does  it  all  mean?  They  cannot 
be  sure. 

This  is  no  fertile  field  for  crass,  popular 
propaganda.  On  the  one  hand  the  Allies  urg- 
ing China  to  join  with  them.  On  the  other 
hand  America,  their  friend.  This  great  coun- 
try sways  back  and  forth  between  them,  very 
much  puzzled. 

So  the  papers  discuss  the  affair  freely,  fran- 
tically, copiously,  favorably  and  unfavorably, 
and  one  wonders  what  the  outcome  will  be. 


WALRUS  AND  CARPENTER     135 

The  first  step,  of  course,  is  to  induce  China  to 
break  diplomatic  relations  with  Germany. 
After  that  the  next  step,  naturally,  will  be  a 
declaration  of  war.  So  high  is  feeling  run- 
ning, that  they  freely  prophesy  that  this  will 
split  the  country  wide  open,  into  civil  war. 
If  China  could  get  rid  of  all  her  European 
masters  at  one  fell  swoop,  well  and  good.  But 
she  hesitates  to  pack  off  one  enemy,  and  sur- 
render herself  hard  and  fast  into  the  keeping 
of  the  rival  group. 

Here  let  me  tell  you  of  a  doctrine  that  seems 
to  be  making  much  headway  in  the  Orient :  we 
have  come  across  it  over  and  over  again,  in 
varying  circumstances.  That  is  the  doctrine 
of  Pan-Asianism,  or  Asia  for  the  Asiatics. 
Logical  enough,  come  to  think  of  it.  The 
Monroe  Doctrine  for  Asia,  in  which  the  Ori- 
entals shall  govern  and  own  themselves,  and 
not  be  subject  to  the  control  and  guidance, 
however  benevolent,  of  Europe.  They  argue 
that  Oriental  control  of  Europe  would  be  hotly 
and  bitterly  resented;  and  they  are  prepared 


136  PEKING  DUST 

to  resent  Occidental  control  of  Asia.  Do  not 
dismiss  this  theory  lightly.  It  is  spreading 
more  and  more  widely  throughout  Asia,  and 
some  day  it  will  be  a  force  to  be  reckoned  with. 
Also,  these  Pan-Asians  will  tell  you  the  con- 
tention that  the  Orientals  cannot  manage  their 
own  affairs  is  untenable.  Japan  is  an  exam- 
ple to  the  contrary.  If  the  smallest  and  least 
of  the  countries  of  Asia  has  been  able  to  do 
this,  it  is  because  she  has  been  let  alone., — not 
conquered,  exploited,  nor  drugged. 

Which  reminds  me  of  that  poem  in  "Through 
the  Looking  Glass,"  called  "The  Walrus  and 
the  Carpenter."  It  will  bear  re-reading. 
The  nations  of  the  East  have  been  playing  the 
part  of  little  oysters  to  the  Walrus  and  the 
Carpenter,  and  the  little  oysters  are  having 
their  eyes  opened. 

...•••• 

"A  loaf  of  bread,"  the  Walrus  said, 

"Is  what  we  chiefly  need: 

Pepper  and  vinegar  besides 

Are  very  good  indeed — 

Now  if  you  're  ready,  Oysters  dear, 

We  can  begin  to  feed." 


.WALRUS  AND  CARPENTER     137 

"But  not  on  us !"  the  Oysters  cried, 

Turning  a  little  blue. 

"After  such  kindness,  that  would  be 

A  dismal  thing  to  do!" 

"The  night  is  fine,"  the  Walrus  said. 

"Do  you  admire  the  view?" 

"It  seems  a  shame,"  the  Walrus  said, 
"To  play  them  such  a  trick. 
After  we  've  brought  them  out  so  far, 
And  made  them  trot  so  quick !" 
The  Carpenter  said  nothing  but 
"The  butter  's  spread  too  thick !" 

"I  weep  for  you,"  the  Walrus  said: 
"I  deeply  sympathize." 
With  sobs  and  tears  he  sorted  out 
Those  of  the  largest  size, 
Holding  his  pocket-handkerchief 
Before  his  streaming  eyes. 

"O  Oysters,"  said  the  Carpenter, 
"You  've  had  a  pleasant  run ! 
Shall  we  be  trotting  home  again?" 
But  answer  came  there  none — 
And  this  was  scarcely  odd,  because 
They  'd  eaten  every  one. 

<(I  like  the  Walrus  best,"  said  Alice:  "because  he 
was  a  little  sorry  for  the  poor  oysters." 


138  PEKING  DUST 

"He  ate  more  than  the  Carpenter,  though,"  said 
Tweedledee.  "You  see  he  held  his  handkerchief  in 
front,  so  that  the  Carpenter  could  n't  count :  con- 
trariwise." 

"That  was  mean !"  Alice  said  indignantly.  "Then 
I  like  the  Carpenter  best — if  he  did  n't  eat  so  many 
as  the  Walrus." 

"But  he  ate  as  many  as  he  could  get,"  said 
Tweedledum. 


IV 


CHINA'S  COURSE  CLEAR 

CHINA  has  sent  a  note  of  protest  to  Ger- 
many, under  date  of  February  9.  It 
was  a  dignified  note,  but,  somehow,  one  could 
almost  see  the  mailed  fist  guiding  the  slim,  aris- 
tocratic, bony  hand  that  penned  it;  the  deli- 
cate, sensitive  hand,  with  long  finger  nails ;  the 
weak  hand  of  China. 

To  His  Excellency  von  Hintze,  Envoy  Extraordi- 
nary and  Minister  Plenipotentiary  of  Germany. 

Your  Excellency:  A  telegraphic  communication 
has  been  received  from  the  Chinese  Minister  at  Ber- 
lin, transmitting  a  note  from  the  German  Govern- 
ment dated  February  1,  1917,  which  makes  known 
that  the  measures  of  blockade  newly  adopted  by  the 
Government  of  Germany  will,  from  that  day,  endan- 
ger neutral  merchant  vessels  navigating  in  certain 
prescribed  zones. 

The  new  menace  of  submarine  warfare  inaugurated 
by  Germany,  imperilling  the  lives  and  property  of 
Chinese  citizens  to  even  greater  extent  than  meas- 

139 


140  PEKING  DUST 

ures  previously  taken  which  have  already  cost  so 
many  human  lives  to  China,  constitute  a  violation 
of  the  principles  of  public  international  law  at  pres- 
ent in  force ;  the  tolerance  of  their  application  would 
have  as  a  result  the  introduction  into  international 
law  of  arbitrary  principles  incompatible  with  even 
legitimate  commercial  intercourse  between  neutral 
states,  and  between  neutral  states  and  belligerent 
powers. 

The  Chinese  Government,  therefore,  protests  ener- 
getically to  the  Imperial  German  Government  against 
the  measures  proclaimed  on  February  1,  and  sin- 
cerely hopes  that  with  a  view  to  respecting  the  rights 
of  neutral  states  and  to  maintaining  the  friendly 
relations  between  these  two  countries,  the  said  meas- 
ures will  not  be  carried  out. 

In  case,  contrary  to  its  expectations,  its  protest 
be  ineffectual,  the  Government  of  the  Chinese  Re- 
public will  be  constrained,  to  its  profound  regret,  to 
sever  the  diplomatic  relations  at  present  existing 
between  the  two  countries.  It  is  unnecessary  to  add 
that  the  attitude  of  the  Chinese  Government  has  been 
dictated  purely  by  the  desire  to  further  the  cause  of 
the  world's  peace  and  by  the  maintenance  of  the 
sanctity  of  international  law. 

Well,  well,  thinks  I,  on  reading  that  note, 
wonders  will  never  cease!  Is  this  the  same 
China,  prating  about  the  sanctity  of  interna- 


CHINA'S  COURSE  CLEAR     141 

tional  law,  that  sat  supine  and  helpless  under 
the  French  grab  of  Lao  Hsi  Kai?  Is  this  the 
same  China  that  accepted  the  deal  of  the 
Shanghai  Opium  Combine,  powerless  to  pre- 
vent it?  How  comes  it  that  she  's  got  this 
sudden  influx  of  moral  strength?  Who  or 
what  has  suddenly  inspired  her  to  make  these 
bold  assertions  about  "arbitrary  principles  in- 
compatible with  even  legitimate  commercial 
intercourse,"  and  what  pressure  is  it  that  sud- 
denly inspires  her  to  step  into  the  arena  as  the 
champion  of  "world's  peace"  and  the  defender 
of  the  "sanctity  of  international  law"? 

Besides  the  note  to  Germany,  China  trans- 
mitted a  note  to  the  United  States.  This  was 
addressed  to  Dr.  Paul  S.  Reinsch,  American 
Minister,  etc.,  to  Peking: 

Your  Excellency:  I  have  the  honor  to  acknowl- 
edge the  receipt  of  Your  Excellency's  Note  of  the 
4th  of  February,  1917,  informing  me  that  the  Gov- 
ernment of  the  United  States  of  America,  in  view 
of  the  adoption  by  the  German  Government  of  its 
new  policy  of  submarine  warfare  on  the  1st  Febru- 
ary, has  decided  to  take  certain  action  which  it 
judges  necessary  as  regards  Germany. 


142  PEKING  DUST 

The  Chinese  Government,  like  the  President  of  the 
United  States  of  America,  is  reluctant  to  believe 
that  the  German  Government  will  actually  carry  into 
execution  those  measures  which  imperil  the  lives  and 
property  of  citizens  of  neutral  countries  and  jeopard- 
ize the  commerce,  even  legitimate,  between  neutrals 
as  well  as  between  neutrals  and  belligerents,  and 
which  tend,  if  allowed  to  be  enforced  without  oppo- 
sition, to  introduce  a  new  principle  into  public  inter- 
national law. 

The  Chinese  Government,  being  in  accord  with  the 
principles  set  forth  in  Your  Excellency's  Note,  and 
firmly  associating  itself  with  the  Government  of  the 
United  States  of  America,  has  taken  similar  action 
by  protesting  energetically  to  the  German  Govern- 
ment against  the  new  measures  of  blockade.  The 
Chinese  Government  also  proposes  to  take  such  action 
in  future  as  will  be  deemed  necessary  for  the  main- 
tenance and  principles  of  international  law. 

Again  I  marveled  at  the  lofty  tone  of  this 
note,  and  wondered  how  this  moral  strength 
had  been  so  suddenly  acquired.  Thought  I  to 
myself,  can  this  be  poor  old  browbeaten 
China, — humbled  and  prostrate  before  the 
powers  of  Europe,  unable  to  protest  when  her 
territory  is  snatched  away  from  her, — now  sud- 
denly giving  voice  to  these  exalted  ideas? 


CHINA'S  COURSE  CLEAR     143 

Does  it  not  seem  rather  ludicrous  that  she 
should  suddenly  proclaim  herself  the  upholder 
of  international  law?  Like  Moses  of  old,  she 
is  now  stretching  forth  her  arms;  but  who  are 
they  who  uphold  those  arms?  These  solemn 
notes  are  given  forth  to  the  world,  and  the 
world  is  asked  to  believe  sincerely,  as  China 
herself  states,  that  they  were  "dictated  purely 
by  the  desire  to  further  the  cause  of  the  world's 
peace  and  by  the  maintenance  of  the  sanctity 
of  international  law."  Let  us  believe  it,  if  we 
can. 

An  editorial  in  the  "Shanghai  Times,"  a 
British  paper,  under  the  date  of  February  12 
throws  some  light  upon  the  matter.  The  arti- 
cle is  entitled  "China's  Course  Clear";  the 
italics  are  mine. 

To  those  of  us  who  live  in  this  corner  of  the  Far 
East,  a  question  of  paramount  importance  is  the 
attitude  which  the  Republic  of  China  is  likely  to  take 
up  in  regard  to  the  war.  The  pendulum  of  Fate 
may  swing  in  our  favor,  and  the  Peking  Government 
— acting  on  the  counsels  of  its  statesmen  and  its 
friends — may  decide  to  unite  its  forces  with  the 
Allies.  This  is  a  question  which  interests  us  indi- 


144  PEKING  DUST 

vidually,  it  touches  our  daily  lives,  and  becomes  a 
theme  of  much  discussion  at  a  moment  when  neu- 
trals are  emphasizing  to  the  Hun  their  rights  and 
their  insistence  of  Germany's  recognition  of  these 
privileges.  .  .  .  Germans  in  Shanghai  and  possibly 
other  ports  are  to-day  existing  on  the  instalments 
which  are  being  paid  as  Boxer  Indemnity.  The 
Germans  have  big  interests  up  north  m  railway  and 
other  enterprises;  they  penetrated  the  Customs  and 
captured  positions  in  other  Government  circles. 
There  is  a  great  deal  at  stake  m  China. 

This  frank  and  lucid  statement  contains  food 
for  thought.  It  may  possibly  lie  at  the  root 
of  China's  sudden  acquisition  of  moral  strength. 
It  is  true  that  the  Japanese  have  acquired 
Shan-tung  since  the  war,  but  there  are  "big 
interests  up  north  in  railway  and  other  enter- 
prises" which  have  not  yet  been  captured. 
Fat  plums  which  may  yet  be  shaken  into  some 
expectant  lap.  But  will  the  Chinese,  in  spite 
of  their  ample  skirts,  have  laps  wide  enough  to 
catch  them?  Would  it  not  be  well  to  see  that 
these  ripe  plums  do  not  fall  into  the  lap  of 
Chinese  incompetence? 

The  Lord  knows. 


FEAE  OF  THE  PLUNGE 

CHINA  is  now  wavering  on  the  brink. 
Having  despatched  her  two  notes,  and 
thereby  proclaimed  herself  worthy  to  rank  as 
a  first-class  power,  with  a  seat  at  the  Peace 
Table  promised  her,  and  all  the  benefits  which 
accrue  therefrom,  she  still  hesitates  to  make 
the  break.  Unquestionably  several  of  her  of- 
ficials and  other  prominent  men  have  already 
succumbed  to  what  the  papers  call  "foreign  in- 
fluence," lured  by  the  words  of  spellbinders, 
but  there  are  others  who  are  stoutly  resisting 
all  appeals,  and  who  see  in  such  a  step  dire 
calamity  for  the  country.  The  fact  that 
China  has  no  real  reason  to  break  with  Ger- 
many makes  the  decision  more  difficult.  A 
plausible  excuse  of  some  kind  must  be  off ered 
the  country,  and  such  flimsy  pretexts  as  the 
necessity  of  upholding  the  sanctity  of  interna- 

145 


146  PEKING  DUST 

tional  law  are  difficult  to  get  away  with.  The 
Chinese  press  is  full  of  the  incongruity  of  the 
situation,  and  outspoken  of  its  amusement. 
Besides  keeping  the  Lao  Hsi  Kai  affair  con- 
stantly before  the  people,  it  is  relentless  in  its 
denunciation  of  Vice-President  Feng's  opium 
deal,  and  the  methods  of  the  British  opium- 
dealers.  Columns  in  regard  to  this  transaction 
are  published  every  day  in  the  papers,  throwing 
light  on  some  new  phase  of  it,  keeping  the 
public  constantly  informed  regarding  it,  and 
asking  the  people  at  large  to  consider  well  the 
advisability  of  allying  themselves  with  such 
friends  as  the  French  and  English  have  proved 
within  the  last  few  months.  Thus,  in  regard 
to  the  opium  deal  we  read: 

High  Official  Offered  Bribe  of  $5,000,000.  A  re- 
port is  current  in  the  Capital  that  some  time  ago, 
a  man  representing  himself  as  the  Manager  of  the 
Shanghai  Opium  Combine,  approached  a  certain  high 
official  and  solicited  his  good  offices  in  consummat- 
ing the  opium  transaction,  which  is  now  being  car- 
ried out  by  the  Vice  President.  According  to  the 
paper,  the  man  promised  the  high  official  five  million 
dollars  as  a  "birthday  present,"  a  euphemistic  terra 


FEAR  OF  THE  PLUNGE       147 

for  bribery  in  this  country,  if  the  Combine,  through 
his  influence,  succeeded  in  concluding  a  deal  with 
the  Government.  The  attempt  fell  through  because 
the  high  official  is  too  honest  to  be  thus  corrupted. 
Finding  the  authorities  in  Peking  incorruptible,  the 
Combine  turned  its  attention  to  Nanking. 

Nanking  being  the  residence  of  Baron  Feng. 

It  is  very  interesting  to  watch  this  struggle, 
to  see  the  various  forces  at  work.  The  pas- 
sions of  the  Chinese  are  being  played  upon: 
the  public  is  constantly  reminded  of  the  insults 
and  indignities  that  China  has  suffered  at  the 
hands  of  those  nations  who  are  now  urging  her 
to  join  with  them.  The  people  are  not  al- 
lowed to  forget  it  is  through  force  and  bribery 
that  China  has  been  reduced  to  her  present 
plight ;  they  are  asked  to  be  skeptical  of  prom- 
ises made  by  those  nations  who  employ  such 
methods.  It  is  having  its  effect,  too,  this  press 
campaign.  While  the  foreign  diplomats  are 
working  upon  a  handful  of  officials,  the  people 
are  being  reminded  of  the  wrongs  they  have 
suffered  through  the  machinations  of  these  dip- 
lomats, representing  predatory  powers. 


148  PEKING  DUST 

But,  after  all,  the  Chinese  people,  four  hun- 
dred millions  of  them,  are  a  negligible  quan- 
tity. The  ultimate  decision  rests  with  a  dozen 
high  officials.  It  simply  remains  to  influence 
these  officials,  and  the  thing  is  done.  They 
are  of  three  types:  those,  like  the  Vice-presi- 
dent, open  to  direct  bribery;  those,  like  the 
premier,  Tuan  Chi  jui,  who  have  political  am- 
bitions and  whose  ambitions  can  be  played 
upon  (they  say  Tuan  wishes  to  become  presi- 
dent) ;  and  certain  others,  of  the  younger 
school,  who  are  dazzled  by  the  promises 
made  to  China  and  are  unable  to  offset 
these  promises  with  the  experience  of  years. 
These  last  rejoice  to  think  that  China  has  been 
promised  a  seat  at  the  Peace  Table,  which 
means  that  China  is  recognized  as  a  first-class 
power.  All  sorts  of  inducements  are  offered, 
including  cancelation  of  the  Boxer  indemnity 
now  being  paid  to  Germany.  (The  Allies 
have  very  obligingly  decided  that  payment  of 
their  own  Boxer  indemnities  shall  be  post- 
poned, not  canceled.)  Also,  there  are  vague, 
indefinite  hints  afloat  to  the  effect  that  if  China 


FEAR  OF  THE  PLUNGE      149 

is  very,  very  good,  the  Allies  will  consider, 
kindly  consider,  the  right  of  China  to  raise  her 
customs-duties.  She  may,  perhaps,  be  allowed 
some  sort  of  protective  tariff.  This  latter  hint 
is  very  vague  indeed,  too  nebulous,  in  fact,  to 
have  much  weight.  But,  after  all,  the  can- 
celation  of  the  German  indemnity  is  something. 

The  disadvantages,  on  the  other  hand,  are 
these:  If  China  enters  the  war,  she  must 
equip  her  armies.  Being  virtually  bankrupt, 
she  must  first  borrow.  From  whom?  She 
must  mortgage  herself  again,  to  somebody,  be- 
fore she  can  borrow  money  to  equip  her  armies. 
And  will  the  country  from  whom  she  borrows 
money,  who  agrees  to  train  and  equip  her 
armies,  also  have  full  military  control  over  the 
affairs  of  China?  Will  that  nation  be  given 
liberty  to  suppress  her  press,  to  stifle  all  oppo- 
sition to  whatever  moves  military  necessity  may 
dictate?  It  looks  like  complete  surrender. 

But  the  Chinese  are  not  blind,  not  all  of 
them.  Nor  are  they  all  corruptible.  And 
very  few  of  them  have  utter,  childlike  faith  in 
the  motives  of  the  Allies.. 


VI 

A  DUST-STORM 

—  INVITED  us  to  go  with  him  to  the 
Gymkana  at  the  race-course. 

"It 's  a  rather  amusing  sight,"  he  explained. 
"You  '11  see  all  foreign  Peking  scrambled  to- 
gether out  there."  Then  he  went  on :  "Take 
the  special  train  from  the  'other  station/  and, 
when  you  arrive,  follow  the  crowd  to  the  club- 
house. I  'm  riding  out  from  town,  so  may  pos- 
sibly be  a  minute  or  two  late,  though  I  expect 
to  be  on  hand  to  welcome  you  when  you  arrive. 
But  if  I  'm  a  little  late,  please  don't  mind." 

We  assured  him  that  we  should  n't  mind  at 
all;  and  then  he  went  on  to  say  that  he  hoped 
we  'd  have  a  pleasant  day  and  no  dust. 

These  dust-storms  are  the  curse  of  Peking 
and  of  North  China.  To-day,  however 
(March  5),  dawned  bright  and  clear  and 

150 


A  DUST-STORM  151 

sunny,  as  usual;  but  clear,  bright  weather  is 
not  necessarily  the  sign  of  a  fine  day  in  this 
part  of  the  world.  Not  in  spring.  Every 
day  is  one  of  brilliant  sunshine,  the  winter  sun- 
shine of  China  just  south  of  the  Great  Wall, 
and  just  south  of  the  Mongolian  desert. 
That 's  where  the  dust  comes  from.  It  blows 
in  straight  from  the  Gobi  Desert,  and  makes 
the  late  winter  and  the  spring,  particularly  the 
spring,  almost  intolerable.  Since  our  return 
we  have  been  having  dust-storms  on  an  average 
of  twice  a  week,  big  ones  and  little  ones,  lasting 
from  a  few  hours  to  several  days.  There  are 
two  kinds :  surface  storms,  when  a  tremendous 
wind  blows  dense  clouds  of  fine,  sharp  dust 
along  the  streets  and  makes  all  outdoors  in- 
tolerable; and  overhead  storms,  which  are  an- 
other thing.  These  latter  really  are  a  curious 
phenomenon :  fine,  red,  powdery  dust  is 
whirled  upward  into  the  higher  levels  of  the 
atmosphere,  blown  overhead  by  the  upper  air 
currents,  from  which  it  drifts  down,  covering 
everything  in  sight.  On  such  occasions  there 
is  frequently  no  wind  at  all  on  the  streets,  but 


152  PEKING  DUST 

the  air  is  so  filled  with  dust  that  the  sun  appears 
as  in  a  fog,  a  red  disk  showing  dimly  througH 
the  thick,  dense  atmosphere.  The  dust  floats 
downward  and  sifts  indoors  through  every 
crack  and  crevice,  until  everything  lies  under  a 
soft  red  blanket.  You  simply  breathe  dust 
for  days ;  there  is  no  possibility  of  escape  until 
the  wind  changes  and  it  is  over. 

To-day,  however,  apparently  was  going  to 
be  a  good  day.  I  ran  down  the  hotel  corridor 
to  look  at  the  flags  flying  over  the  legation 
quarter,  the  flags  of  most  of  the  nations  of  the 
world.  The  sight  was  reassuring.  No  wind 
at  all,  apparently;  they  were  all  idly  flapping 
from  their  poles,  whereas  yesterday  they  had 
been  frantically  tearing  at  them,  whipped  out 
stiff  by  a  piercing,  cold  north  wind.  So  we 
took  rickshaws  and  were  soon  running  along 
toward  the  Hankow  station,  where  we  found 
a  large  crowd  of  foreigners  assembling  for  the 
special  train  that  was  to  take  us  to  Pao  Ma 
Tchang,  literally  "Run  Horse  Place,"  the  race- 
course six  miles  from  Peking. 

When  we  dismounted,  we  had  the  usual  ar- 


A  DUST-STORM  153 

guments  with  the  coolies  as  to  fares.  There 
are  three  classes  of  fares  here, — one  for  the 
Chinese,  one  for  the  sophisticated  resident,  and 
one  for  the  tourist;  each  one  double  that  for 
the  preceding  class.  By  this  time  we  consider 
ourselves  sufficiently  at  home  to  pay  the  tariff 
which  the  foreign  residents  pay,  sufficiently 
sophisticated  to  avoid  being  overcharged.  No 
use.  We  never  seem  able  to  manage  it.  In- 
side of  a  minute  we  had  half  the  coolies  of 
Peking  yelling  round  us,  just  as  if  we  were  the 
greenest  tourists  that  ever  set  foot  on  Chinese 
soil.  I  'm  sorry  for  the  rickshaw  boys,  they 
have  a  hard  life  of  it;  yet  I  must  confess  that 
our  sympathies  are  somewhat  alienated  by  the 
way  they  "do"  us  on  every  possible  occasion. 
The  special  was  waiting  in  the  station,  and 
we  installed  ourselves  in  a  compartment  and 
looked  eagerly  out  upon  the  platform  for  the 
signs  of  the  "scrambling"  we  had  come  to  see. 
There  it  was,  too,  all  the  Who 's  Who  of 
Peking, — all  the  ministers  and  secretaries  of 
the  legations,  with  their  families  and  guests, 
and  all  the  foreign  residents  of  the  legation 


154  PEKING  DUST 

quarter  and  the  East  City  and  the  West  City 
and  every  city  contained  within  the  walls  of  the 
capital.  Americans,  English,  French,  Danes, 
Russians,  Swedes;  only  the  Germans  were  ab- 
sent. The  railway  pierces  the  wall  of  the 
West  City,  and  for  a  time  we  ran  along  under 
the  walls  outside,  with  the  great  crenelated 
battlements  rising  above  us,  and  their  mag- 
nificent gates  or  towers  glittering  in  the  sun- 
shine. How  incongruous  and  insignificant 
seemed  that  train-load  of  chattering  foreign- 
ers beneath  the  majestic,  towering  ramparts  of 
this  old  royal  city !  The  arid  plains  presented 
rather  a  Biblical  appearance,  with  camel-trains 
moving  slowly  across  the  desolate  landscape, 
while  here  and  there  flocks  of  broad-tailed 
sheep  were  browsing,  tended  by  their  shep- 
herds. We  passed  the  usual  graves, — little 
mounds  of  earth  ploughed  round  very  closely, 
as  closely  as  the  people  felt  they  might  without 
disturbing  the  spirits  within. 

Twenty  minutes  later  we  came  to  a  stop  on 
the  plains,  and  every  one  began  getting  off. 
In  a  moment  we  were  surrounded  by  crowds 


A  DUST-STORM  155 

of  yelling  donkey-boys  leading  donkeys,  and 
a  few  rickshaw-pullers  as  well.  •  No  one 
seemed  to  care  for  either  form  of  conveyance, 
and  we  soon  left  behind  the  blue-coated  coolies 
still  shouting  the  merits  of  their  tiny  gray  don- 
keys with  their  tinkling  bells,  and  began  a 
journey  on  foot  across  the  dusty  plain.  Road 
there  was  none :  merely  an  ill-defined  track  pre- 
sented itself,  along  which  all  the  ministers  and 
secretaries  of  the  great  nations  of  the  world 
walked,  ankle-deep  in  dust. 

But  something  had  gone  wrong  with  the 
weather.  Our  pleasant  day,  on  which  we  had 
staked  our  hopes,  had  somehow  disappeared. 
We  had  noticed,  as  the  train  moved  along,  that 
clouds  of  dust  seemed  to  be  rising ;  but  we  laid 
this  to  the  speed  of  the  train,  fully  twelve 
miles  an  hour.  But  once  outside  the  shelter  of 
our  carriage,  it  was  impossible  to  deceive  our- 
selves any  longer.  The  wind  was  rising,  and 
the  dry  dust  of  many  rainless  months  was  ris- 
ing with  it,  flying  in  dense,  enveloping  clouds. 
It  was  a  curious  sight  that  presented  itself:  a 
long,  straggling  procession  of  two  or  three 


156  PEKING  DUST 

hundred  men  and  women,  beating  their  way, 
heads  downward,  across  the  plains  of  Chili  in 
what  turned  out  to  be  a  dust-storm  of  colos- 
sal proportions.  Presently  the  Chinese  band 
passed  us,  its  members  mounted  on  donkeys, 
galloping  by  with  their  drums  and  horns  bump- 
ing up  and  down  behind  them.  We  were  glad 
when  they  disappeared  over  a  knoll  on  the 
horizon. 

We  finally  reached  the  club-house,  a  simple, 
unpretentious  little  building,  with  wide,  open 
verandas  in  front,  which  afforded  no  shelter 
from  the  biting  wind.  The  whole  procession 
staggered  in,  a  choking,  coughing,  sputtering 
crowd,  and  from  one  end  of  the  line  to  the 
other  rose  imprecations  on  the  weather,  in  every 
language  known  to  Europe.  As  E—  -  and 
I  stood  there,  beating  the  dust  off  our  clothes 

and  looking  for  some  sign  of  S ,  one  of  the 

foreign  ministers  came  up  to  us,  raising  an 
immaculate  gray  hat,  in  sharp  contrast  to  a 
very  dusty  overcoat.  "Have  you  an  invitation 
to  tiffin?"  he  asked,  as  he  shook  hands.  We 
hastily  said  we  had,  were  expecting  our  host 


A  DUST-STORM  157 

any  minute.  We  don't  know  what  his  inten- 
tions were.  These  are  war  times,  and  Peking 
is  surging  with  furious  suspicions.  He  may 
have  meant  to  ask  us  to  lunch  with  him,  or  he 
may  have  meant  to  put  us  out  as  intruders. 
Fortunately,  at  that  minute  S —  -  appeared 
round  the  corner,  wiping  his  face  and  eyes ;  he 
claimed  us  and  all  was  well. 

Two  or  three  races  were  to  be  run  before 
tiffin,  and  we  went  out  to  have  a  look  at  the 
ponies,  little  Mongolian  ponies  with  short, 
clipped  hair.  They  were  the  same  breed  as  the 
shaggy  little  animals  one  sees  everywhere  in 

Peking.     E and  I  know  nothing  of  horses ; 

there  's  no  use  pretending.  But  in  spite  of 
that  blinding  dust,  every  one  else  was  attempt- 
ing to  distinguish  the  various  points,  good  and 
bad,  of  the  snorting,  struggling  little  beasts, 
who  were  as  unhappy  about  the  weather  as  we 
were.  And  between  you  and  me,  I  think  it 
was  a  fine  affectation  to  pretend  to  distinguish 
qualities  in  that  storm.  In  the  paddock  rac- 
ing-camels and  donkeys  also  were  tied  up,  and 
let  me  say  I  think  it  was  all  an  honest  person 


158  PEKING  DUST 

could  do  in  the  circumstances  to  tell  the  differ- 
ence between  a  camel  and  a  horse.  Our  inter- 
est centered  in  the  camels,  the  great,  disdainful 
camels,  who  looked  down  upon  ministers  plen- 
ipotentiary and  potentates  and  powers  with 
such  superb  hauteur.  Really,  these  Peking 
camels  are  the  aristocrats  of  the  world;  you 
feel  it  every  time  they  condescend  to  glance  at 
you. 

The  wind,  which  was  getting  higher  and 
colder  every  moment,  soon  drove  all  but  the 
most  ardent  enthusiasts  indoors.  We  mounted 
to  the  upper  story  of  the  club-house,  and  looked 
out  over  the  course  from  the  windows  of  the 
big  dining-room,  which  occupies  the  entire 
upper  floor.  Before  us  stretched  the  same 
bleak,  arid  plains  that  we  had  crossed  on  our 
way  from  the  station :  only  the  railing  marking 
the  outer  boundaries  of  the  track  divided  it 
from  the  barren  stretches  of  earth  which  ex- 
tended northward  to  the  uttermost  confines  of 
China.  Not  a  blade  of  grass  was  anywhere  in 
sight.  And  over  all,  the  dust — not  the  or- 
dinary dust  of  a  windy  March  day  at  home, 


A  DUST-STORM  159 

but  great,  thick,  solid  clouds  of  dust,  reach- 
ing upward,  and  covering  the  entire  sky.  The 
noon  sun  gleamed  down  in  a  circle  of  hazy 
red. 

There  were  two  races  before  lunch.  One 
could  n't  see  the  ponies  till  they  were  within  a 
hundred  yards  of  the  winning-post.  S—  — , 
who  has  great  courage,  and  moreover  felt  his 
responsibility  as  host,  would  remain  outside 
on  the  upper  veranda,  straining  his  eyes  in  the 
biting  gale,  and  then  signal  to  us  when  they 
came  in  sight.  Whereupon  we  would  rush 
outdoors  for  a  brief  moment,  clinging  to  our 
hats  and  groping  for  the  veranda  rail,  and 
stand  there  for  an  agonizing  minute  till  he 
told  us  it  was  over. 

Now  and  then,  in  brief  pauses  in  the  wind, 
the  horizon  would  clear  for  a  moment  and  we 
could  see  beyond  the  outer  boundaries  of  the 
course.  We  caught  occasional  glimpses  of 
long  caravans  of  camels,  two  or  three  hundred 
of  them,  bound  for  the  coal-mines  up  north. 
Once,  in  a  short  interval,  we  saw  a  funeral 
procession  stretching  away  over  the  plains — a 


160  PEKING  DUST 

straggling  procession  on  foot,  in  dingy  white 
dresses,  carrying  banners  and  flags  and  para- 
sols. The  coffin  was  slung  on  a  pole  between 
bearers,  and  the  wailing  drone  of  a  horn,  and 
the  thud  of  a  big  drum  came  down  the  wind. 
Then  the  dust  rose  again,  and  the  melancholy 
sight  was  shut  out.  How  curious  was  this  lit- 
tle pleasure  spot  of  the  Europeans,  in  the 
midst  of  this  barbaric  setting,  in  the  heart  of 
old,  old  Asia! 

Tiffin  time.  Every  one  who  had  not  al- 
ready taken  refuge  in  the  dining-room  now 
trooped  up-stairs,  hungry  and  laughing.  I 
must  tell  you  of  the  dining-room.  It  was  just 
a  huge,  square,  bare  room,  with  whitewashed 
walls,  with  not  a  picture,  with  not  an  attempt 
at  decoration.  A  dozen  trestle  tables  ran 
across  it,  with  narrow,  backless  benches  on  each 
side, — benches  which  had  to  be  stepped  over 
before  one  could  sit  down.  Every  one 
stepped  over  them,  however — ministers  and 
first-secretaries  and  Russian  princesses  and 
smart  American  women;  and  you  had  to  step 
over  them  again  when  the  meal  was  finished, 


A  DUST-STORM  161 

too,  unless  by  some  preconcerted  agreement 
every  one  rose  at  the  same  time.  There  was 
not  a  chair  in  the  place.  Every  one  was  dust- 
grimed,  wind-blown  and  bedraggled,  and  it 
was  a  gay,  noisy  meal,  with  laughter  and  ciga- 
rette smoke  and  dust  all  through  it. 

In  spite  of  the  noise,  however,  there  seemed 
little  real  merriment.  One  became  conscious 
of  the  atmosphere, — of  the  forced,  rather 
strained,  I  was  going  to  say  hostile,  atmos- 
phere. Every  nation,  as  if  by  prearrange- 
ment,  withdrew  to  itself.  The  English  sat 
together,  the  French  sat  together ;  the  Russians 
were  apart ;  and  the  Americans  in  still  another 
section.  There  was  no  real  intermingling,  no 
real  camaraderie,  except  among  the  individual 
groups.  There  was  much  hand-shaking  of 
course,  and  greetings  and  perfunctory  polite- 
ness, but  no  genuine  friendliness.  The  various 
ministers,  for  instance,  did  not  sit  together  as 
ministers,  off  on  a  holiday.  On  the  contrary, 
each  one  sat  at  the  table  with  his  countrymen. 
Over  all  there  was  a  feeling  of  constraint,  dis- 
trust, national  antipathies  but  thinly  veiled, 


162  PEKING  DUST 

with  but  the  merest  superficial  pretense  of  dis- 
guising intense  dislikes  and  jealousies. 

In  Peking  there  is  great  freedom  of  speech, 
and  much  outspoken  criticism  of  one  nation  by 
another;  for  there  hatred  and  suspicions  run 
high.  Therefore,  of  course,  such  feelings 
could  not  be  submerged  on  an  occasion  of  this 
kind.  Perhaps  the  war  has  intensified  them; 
perhaps  they  are  always  there;  perhaps  this  is 
the  chronic  atmosphere  of  Peking,  where  each 
power  is  trying  to  outdo  the  other,  to  over- 
reach the  other,  in  their  dealings  with  China. 

Anyway,  E and  I  were  intensely  aware  of 

it  in  this  "scrambling  together"  of  all  diplo- 
matic Peking. 

No  Japanese  was  present,  although  a  few 
Japanese  are  members  of  the  club.  And  it  is 
significant  that  no  Chinese,  no  matter  how 
high  in  rank,  is  admitted  to  membership.  The 
impression  we  derived  of  this  European  play- 
ground is  that  the  attempt  to  play  is  a  farce. 
You  look  over  your  shoulder  to  behold  a  knife 
at  your  back. 

After  tiffin  two  more  invisible  races  took 


A  DUST-STORM  163 

place,  but  no  one  made  an  attempt  to  see  them. 
The  dust  sifted  in  through  the  windows  and 
lay  thick  on  the  tables,  and  one  made  footprints 
in  it  on  the  floor.  Then  we  were  all  cheered 
by  the  announcement  that  the  special  train  was 
returning  an  hour  earlier  than  the  time  sched- 
uled, and  there  was  a  general  move  to  go.  The 
walk  back  across  the  plains  was  even  worse,  if 
possible,  than  that  from  the  station  to  the 
club-house,  for  the  wind  was  stronger,  the  dust 
more  blinding.  Yet  the  whole  procession  was 
light-hearted,  somehow:  there  were  prospects 
of  a  bath  at  the  journey's  end.  As  we 
reached  the  station  the  train  was  pulling  in. 

E was  walking  just  ahead  of  me,  talking 

to  the  Russian  minister,  Prince  K .     A 

gust  more  violent  than  usual  struck  us,  and  I 
saw  her  suddenly  leap  aboard  while  the  train 
was  moving.  When  I  joined  her  a  moment 
later  she  seemed  rather  dubious. 

"I  don't  know  that  that 's  exactly  the  way 
to  take  leave  of  a  prince,"  she  said  doubtfully, 
"to  jump  on  a  moving  train  in  the  middle  of  a 
sentence." 


VII 

A  BOWL  OF   PORRIDGE 

WHILE  we  were  at  the  races  yesterday 
in  all  that  dust,  exciting  things  were 
happening  in  Peking.  We  no  sooner  returned 
to  the  hotel  than  there  were  a  dozen  people  to 
tell  us  of  them.  It  seems  that  at  a  cabinet 
meeting  yesterday  morning  (March  5)  the 
prime  minister,  Tuan  Chi  jui,  wished  to  send  a 
circular  telegram  to  the  governors  of  the  va- 
rious provinces  announcing  China's  determi- 
nation to  sever  diplomatic  relations  with  Ger- 
many. The  President  of  China,  Li  Yuan 
Hung,  who  is  strongly  opposed  to  this  course, 
rejected  the  premier's  proposal,  whereupon 
Tuan  tendered  his  resignation  and  flew  off  in 
a  huff  to  Tientsin.  Tuan  is  forever  resigning 
his  post  as  prime  minister,  and  is  forever  being 
coaxed  back.  A  deputation  to  coax  him  back 
was  sent  the  day  afterward,  and  there  were 

164 


A  BOWL  OF  PORRIDGE       165 

those  who  hoped  he  would  return  and  those 
who  hoped  he  would  n't.  And  now,  a  day  or 
two  later  (March  7)  back  he  comes  and  all  is 
well.  The  problem,  however,  is  still  to  be  set- 
tled. Tuan  is  pretty  powerful,  has  the  back- 
ing of  the  military,  and  is  said  to  be  desirous 
of  becoming  president.  It  is  all  very  compli- 
cated and  difficult  to  understand,  and  there  are 
rumors  floating  about  that  he  departed  not  be- 
cause the  President  refused  to  break  with  Ger- 
many but  because  his  life  was  in  danger. 
There  was  some  plot  on  foot  to  assassinate  him, 
and  his  suggestion  concerning  the  telegram  to 
the  governors  was  merely  an  excuse  for  his 
resignation,  for  the  necessity  for  quickly  leav- 
ing Peking.  Plots  to  assassinate  people  al- 
ways occur  at  critical  moments,  and  it  is  most 
uncomfortable  for  all  concerned. 

The  papers  are  full  of  tales  of  coercion,  of 
charges  of  bribery,  of  hints  of  pressure  being 
brought  to  bear  upon  Chinese  officials.  China 
must  be  made  to  break  with  Germany  and  to 
do  it  soon.  A  few  days  ago  we  met  an  intelli- 
gent little  Chinese  lady,  wife  of  an  "official  in 


166  PEKING  DUST 

waiting."  (This  is  a  nice  title,  and  means  an 
official  waiting  for  a  job.)  She  is  an  alert, 
well-educated,  advanced  little  person,  who  has 
spent  several  years  in  America,  and  speaks 
English  fluently  with  almost  no  accent.  She 
is  thoroughly  conversant  with  the  present  po- 
litical situation,  too, — having  doubtless  dis- 
cussed it  with  her  husband,  the  official  in  wait- 
ing,— and  was  most  outspoken  concerning  it. 
She  grew  very  indignant  as  she  spoke  of  the 
pressure  being  brought  to  bear  upon  China, 
and  she  told  of  a  dinner  recently  given  in 
Peking,  given  by  certain  foreign  officials  to 
certain  Chinese  officials  whom  they  wished  to 
"influence."  When  the  plates  were  lifted,  a 
check  was  found  lying  beneath  each  plate. 
She  got  so  excited  over  this  incident — as  I  did, 
too — that  I  forgot  to  ask  her  what  the  Chinese 
officials  did  with  these  checks. 

"I  should  think  you  would  hate  all  foreign- 
ers," I  said.  "I  should,  in  your  place." 

"We  do!"  she  replied  emphatically,  and  her 
black  eyes  flashed.  "Why  don't  you  leave  us 
alone?" 


A  BOWL  OF  PORRIDGE       167 

"Which  of  us  do  you  hate  most?"  I  asked, 
"or  least? — if  you  like  it  better  that  way." 

The  Chinese  have  a  delightful  sense  of 
humor,  something  that  you  can  always  count 
upon.  She  wrung  her  little  claw-like  hands 
together,  twisted  them  with  emotion;  yet  her 
sense  of  humor  prevailed.  She  flashed  a  bril- 
liant smile  upon  me. 

"You  Americans  we  hate  least,"  she  ex- 
plained. "You  have  done  the  least  harm  to  us. 
And  some  of  you,  individually,  we  like." 

"But,  naturally,  you  hate  us  all?" 

"Why  not?"  she  replied.  "See  what  you 
foreigners  are  doing  to  us,  have  done  to  us, 
are  still  trying  to  do  to  us.  Can  you  blame 
us?  Judge  for  yourself." 

"I  can  perfectly  understand  your  Boxer  up- 
rising," I  told  her,  "when  you  tried  to  get  rid 
of  us  all—" 

"I  'm  glad  you  can  understand  that,"  she  re- 
torted. "Few  foreigners  do.  We  feel  that 
way  still ;  only  we  can't  show  it  as  we  did  then." 

Into  my  mind  came  a  recollection  of  the  high 
stone  wall  surrounding  the  British  legation,  on 


168  PEKING  DUST 

which  are  painted  the  words,  "Lest  we  forget." 
Every  day,  as  one  passes  in  or  out  of  the  lega- 
tion quarter  by  that  road,  one's  attention  is  ar- 
rested by  those  words.  "Lest  we  forget." 
Every  foreigner  in  Peking  is  thus  reminded  of 
those  dreadful  months  of  siege  in  1900.  But 
so  is  every  Chinese  of  the  upper  classes;  so  is 
every  rickshaw  coolie  who  stops  to  point  out 
those  words  to  the  tourists  as  he  passes.  Why 
remember?  Why  not  try  to  forget?  Neither 
side  will  forget.  Neither  foreigner  nor  Chi- 
nese has  any  intention  of  forgetting.  The 
huge  indemnities  that  are  paid  out  year  by 
year  by  the  Chinese  make  forgetting  impossi- 
ble. Of  all  the  countries  that  received  an  in- 
demnity, America  was  the  only  one  that  tried 
to  forget.  Yet  she  did  it  by  erecting  a  monu- 
ment to  her  forgetfulness,  or  forgivingness,  in 
the  shape  of  a  college-preparatory  school  for 
Chinese  boys,  and  is  using  part  of  her  yearly 
indemnity  fund  to  maintain  it;  and  "Lest  we 
forget"  is  written  large  upon  its  walls. 

But  in  contrast  to  the  bitterness  of  the  little 
Chinese  lady,  we  received  an  impression  to-day 


A  BOWL  OF  PORRIDGE       169 

of  quite  opposite  character.  We  called  upon 
the  editor  of  one  of  the  Chinese  papers.  We 
have  seen  him  many  times,  and  he  has  often 
had  tea  with  us  in  the  lobby  of  our  hotel,  but 
upon  this  occasion  he  sent  us  a  note  and  asked 
us  to  call  on  him  at  his  office.  He  kept  us 
waiting  a  few  minutes  in  a  shabby,  dingy  of- 
fice, littered  with  papers  and  newspaper  clip- 
pings, the  regulation  untidy  office  of  a  news- 
paper man.  When  he  finally  arrived,  after 
ten  minutes'  delay,  he  apologized  profusely, 
saying  it  was  five  o'clock,  the  hour  for  his  bowl 
of  porridge.  He  looked  as  if  he  needed  it,  too, 
for  he  was  a  thin,  nervous  little  man,  a  burn- 
ing, ardent  soul  contained  in  a  gaunt,  emaciated 
body. 

Straightway,  after  his  allusion  to  his  por- 
ridge, he  burst  into  a  eulogy  of  America,  such 
as  it  did  our  hearts  good  to  hear.  In  his  mind 
there  was  absolutely  no  question  that  China 
should  trust  herself  to  America,  enter  the  war 
on  the  side  of  America.  No  other  nation  in 
the  world,  he  said,  had  such  great  ideals,  and 
^o  thoroughly  lived  up  to  them.  Wilson's 


170  PEKING  DUST 

Mexican  policy  filled  him  with  enthusiasm;  he 
spoke  of  it  at  length,  almost  with  tears  in  his 
eyes.  Next  he  touched  on  our  Philippine  pos- 
sessions. Our  record  in  the  Philippines  is  an 
example  to  the  world.  No»exploitation  of  a 
helpless  people  but  a  noble  constructive  policy 
to  educate  them,  develop  them,  and,  finally, 
bring  them  to  a  point  where  they  could  exercise 
their  own  sovereignty.  The  first  thing  we  did, 
he  reminded  us,  on  taking  possession  of  the 
Philippines,  was  to  throw  out  opium.  It  was 
at  that  time  a  drug-sodden  country,  but  our 
first  act  was  to  banish  the  traffic,  root  and 
branch. 

It  was  also  America,  he  went  on,  which  had 
given  China  moral  support  and  active  backing 
in  her  ten-years'  struggle  against  the  drug. 
We  had  called  together  the  Opium  Conference 
at  Shanghai,  and  later  the  Hague  Interna- 
tional Opium  Conference,  and  owing  to  the 
publicity  gained  through  these  conferences 
China  had  had  the  courage  to  demand  the  op- 
portunity to  eradicate  the  curse.  On  and  on 
he  went,  and  it  was  good  hearing.  He  would 


A  BOWL  OF  PORRIDGE       171 

use  his  influence,  and  it  was  great,  to  induce 
China  to  accept  America's  invitation  and  enter 
the  war  on  the  side  of  the  Allies. 

It  made  one  rather  humble  to  hear  him. 
China  will  place  her  fate  and  her  fortunes  so 
implicitly  in  our  hands.  It  will  be  a  great 
responsibility  for  us  to  meet.  Do  you  think 
we  can  do  so? 


VIII 

FROM   A   SCRAP-BOOK 

THIS  is  n't  a  letter.  I  shall  take  a  buncK 
of  old  newspapers  and  with  scissors  and 
paste-pot,  stick  upon  this  sheet  of  paper  such 
press  comments  as  seem  relevant  to  the  situ- 
ation. First  of  all,  remember  that  China  has 
a  population  of  four  hundred  million  people,  of 
whom  three  hundred  and  ninety-nine  million 
have  never  heard  of  the  European  war.  But 
the  opinion  of  the  million  that  may  have  heard 
of  it  is  of  no  moment.  The  few  people  it  is 
necessary  to  convert  to  a  sympathetic  under- 
standing of  the  European  war  are  the  handful 
of  officials  composing  the  Cabinet,  about  two 
hundred  members  of  Parliament,  and  a  small, 
outlying  fringe  of  "officials  in  waiting"  and 
other  odds  and  ends,  generals  and  such  like. 
Once  convince  them,  and  the  thing  is  done. 
The  understanding  million,  and  the  three  hun- 

172 


FROM  A  SCRAP-BOOK         178 

dred  and  ninety-nine  millions  who  do  not  un- 
derstand are  negligible.  At  present  there  is 
a  good  deal  of  talk  about  restoring  the  mon- 
archy. You  don't  have  to  deal  with  as  many 
people  in  a  monarchy  as  in  a  so-called  repub- 
lic. A  monarchy  is  a  more  wieldy  body. 
China,  however,  a  five-year-old  republic,  is  be- 
having just  like  any  other  democracy, — forever 
appealing  to  the  people,  as  if  the  people  even 
in  a  democracy  had  any  chance  against  their 
masters  and  rulers. 

Thus  the  "Peking  Gazette,"  under  date  of 
Tuesday,  March  1: 

The  Entente  and  China.  Reported  Allied  Deci- 
sion. A  report  reaches  us — which  we  have  been 
unable  to  confirm — that  the  Entente  Ministers  and 
Charges  d'Affaires  in  the  capital  met  at  the  French 
Legation  on  Tuesday  and  considered  the  advisabil- 
ity of  deputing  the  Japanese  Charge  d'Affaires  to 
call  on  the  President,  the  Vice-President  and  the 
Premier,  to  ascertain  the  decision  of  the  Chinese 
Government  regarding  further  action  against  Ger- 
many. In  the  event  of  failure  on  the  part  of  the 
Chinese  Government  to  decide  on  the  matter  this 
week,  the  report  adds  that  a  joint  Allied  inquiry  will 
follow  next  week. 


PEKING  DUST 

In  the  absence  of  confirmation,  we  have  to  reserve 
comment  on  what  looks  like  an  amazing  blunder,  if 
true.  In  the  meantime,  we  have  to  warn  those  con- 
cerned, that  unless  they  are  bent  on  alienating  the 
growing  Chinese  sympathy  for  the  Allied  cause,  and 
arresting  the  powerful  movement  for  some  form  of 
action,  in  association  with  or  in  cooperation  with  the 
Entente,  it  will  be  well  if  anything  like  Allied  pres- 
sure be  avoided  at  this  juncture. 

Since  writing  the  foregoing — or  rather  as  we  go 
to  press — we  learn  from  a  responsible  quarter  that 
the  French  Minister  and  the  Belgian  Charge  d'Af- 
faires  called  at  the  Chinese  Foreign  Office  yesterday 
afternoon  and  either  informally  suggested  or  actually 
invited  China  to  join  the  Entente.  In  the  name  of 
the  Allies,  they  are  understood  to  have  promised  the 
postponement  of  the  instalments  of  the  Boxer  in- 
demnities accruing  due  and  payable  during  the  war, 
and  guaranteed  the  revision  of  the  Chinese  customs 
tariff.  We  have  just  time  to  register  our  emphatic 
protest  against  this  proceeding;  and  limiting  our- 
selves to  the  bare  statement  of  one  of  the  many  grave 
objections  to  this  action  of  the  Entente,  we  have  to 
point  out  that  it  is  not  real  Chinese  interest  for  the 
Allies  to  thrust  large  sums  of  money  on  persons 
who  may  not  be  able  to  apply  the  same  to  national 
ends.  The  Chinese  Government  is  in  need  of  money 
for  specific  objects,  like  the  resumption  of  specie 
payment,  the  disbandment  of  superfluous  troops,  and 


FROM  A  SCRAP-BOOK        175 

the  liquidation  of  certain  unfunded  indemnities. 
Financial  assistance  to  the  authorities  is  something 
for  which  the  country  would  feel  grateful  to  any 
Power  or  group  of  Powers  who  might  render  the 
same.  But  Chinese  who  have  the  real  interest  of 
their  country  at  heart  will  not  thank  those  who — 
without  regard  to  the  vital  interest  of  China — are  re- 
solved upon  securing  the  support  of  a  few  ambitious 
men  whose  single  aim  is  to  have  enough  money  to  in- 
fluence, first,  the  Parliamentary  elections,  due  in  a 
few  months,  and  next,  the  Presidential  election  to  be 
held  next  year.  Curses  not  blessings  would  issue 
from  our  lips  for  such  questionable  assistance  to  the 
forces  of  reaction  in  Peking. 

On  March  2  appears  a  translation  from  a 
vernacular  paper,  the  "Shuntien  Shih-Pao": 

At  a  recent  meeting  of  Allied  Ministers  in  the 
French  Legation,  it  was  decided  that  if  China  does 
not  declare  her  intention  to  join  the  Allied  nations 
within  the  next  few  days,  the  Allied  nations  should 
give  advice  to  China  to  that  effect. 

Apart  from  "advice"  of  this  sort, — rather 
threatening  advice,  it  would  seem, — appeals 
are  being  made  to  Chinese  vanity,  by  the  con- 
trasting of  the  potential  might  of  China  with 
the  might  of  Japan.  In  an  article  entitled 


176  PEKING  DUST 

"China  and  the  World  War,"  Putnam  Weale, 
speaking  for  the  British  interests  in  China, 
makes  some  clever  but  rather  blunt  sugges- 
tions : 

i 
So  far,  no  one  has  gone  beyond  suggesting  the 

general  mobilization  of  Chinese  labor-battalions, 
some  of  which  are  already  at  work  on  the  Tigris 
building  docks,  and  thereby  contributing  very  mate- 
rially to  the  vastly  improved  position  in  Mesopo- 
tamia. But  it  does  not  do  credit  to  the  stature  of 
the  Chinese  giant,  or  to  the  qualities  of  the  Chinese 
intellect,  for  Chinese  to  remain  hewers  of  wood  and 
drawers  of  water ;  it  is  imperative  that  if  the  nation 
goes  to  war  she  should  actually  fight,  as  the  experi- 
ence of  the  last  five  years  shows  what  she  can  do  with 
skill  and  science.  In  advancing  the  contention  that 
a  definite  offer  of  a  picked  Chinese  Division,  or  of 
several  divisions,  to  Great  Britain,  against  a  definite 
treaty,  to  hasten  the  Mesopotamian  campaign  would 
be  a  master-stroke  of  policy,  we  have  to  recall  that 
Japan  herself  refused  to  send  contingents  to  the 
Balkans,  and  is  therefore  looked  upon  as  a  semi-bel- 
ligerent whose  stature  can  at  once  be  overtopped  by 
the  Chinese  giant  merely  rising  to  his  feet. 

A  clipping  from  a  Paris  paper,  the  "Petit 
Parisien,"  has  been  reproduced  in  the  Chinese 
press,  and  given  prominence.  The  Chinese 


FROM  A  SCRAP-BOOK 

colossus  is  not  asked  to  rise  to  its  feet  merely 
to  demonstrate  its  huge  proportions.  If  it 
rises,  it  must  be  to  serve  a  purpose.  With  a 
simple  frankness  due  perhaps  to  a  failure  to 
consider  possible  quotation  in  the  Peking  press, 
the  "Petit  Parisien"  comments  upon  the 
"Value  of  China's  Intervention"  thus: 

The  intervention  of  China  is  not  to  be  underrated. 
The  Chinese  army  at  present  is  sufficiently  instructed 
and  equipped,  well  officered  and  supplied,  and  pos- 
sesses large  reserves.  The  military  schools  are  in  a 
position  to  train  nearly  five  thousand  officers  a  year, 
and  this  figure  could  be  increased  five  times,  if  needed. 
The  natural  resources  of  China  would  enable  her  to 
supply  raw  materials  for  the  ammunition  and  ma- 
chinery, as  well  as  leather,  cotton,  rice,  tea,  and 
other  commodities. 

In  exchange  for  these  natural  resources,  to 
develop  which  China  will  have  to  mortgage 
herself  to  the  Allies,  is  offered  cancelation  of 
the  Boxer  indemnity  to  the  Germans,  and  post- 
ponement ,  (not  cancelation)  of  the  indemni- 
ties paid  to  the  other  nations.  There  are  also, 
as  I  have  said  before,  vague  hints  that  China 
may  be  allowed  to  revise  her  tariffs  and  place 


178  PEKING  DUST 

a  duty  upon  certain  commodities.  But  even 
with  the  first  suggestion  of  such  tariff  revision 
comes  opposition,  from  Japan.  The  Allies, 
who  have  no  cotton  to  import  to  China  at  the 
present  moment,  may  generously  consent  to 
protective  duties  on  this  article,  but  Japan, 
which  has  plenty  of  it  to  import,  objects  to  a 
handicap  to  her  cotton-trafle.  If  the  Allies 
require  China's  intervention,  then  let  them  pay 
for  it.  Thus  the  "Chugwai  Shogyo,"  a  Japa- 
nese newspaper,  under  date  of  March  7: 

Buying  China's  Friendship.  We  maintain  that 
the  Foreign  Office  [Japanese]  officials  should  reso- 
lutely refuse  to  agree  to  the  raising  of  the  Chinese 
customs  tariff.  But  it  is  reported  that  the  officials 
are  backing  out.  They  are  goody-goody  people. 
They  seem  to  think  that  the  Chinese  proposal  is  a  just 
one.  There  is  no  reason  why  China  should  make 
any  unjust  claim.  But  even  if  China's  claim  is  in- 
trinsically just  from  her  own  standpoint,  we  should 
not  agree  to  it  if  it  is  disadvantageous  to  us.  Be- 
sides, if  China  makes  that  claim  as  her  condition 
of  her  joining  the  Entente  Powers,  it  is  not  right. 
If  China  thinks  that  to  sever  her  relations  with  Ger- 
many and  Austria  is  disadvantageous  to  her,  and 
therefore  wants  to  obtain  a  quid  pro  quo  for  so 


FROM  A  SCRAP-BOOK         179 

doing,  this  consideration  should  be  given  by  the  En- 
tente Powers,  not  Japan.  Is  the  participation  in  the 
war  beneficial  to  China  or  to  the  Entente  Powers? 
If  the  former,  then  China  should  not  ask  any  com- 
pensation. If  the  latter,  then  the  compensation 
should  be  paid  by  the  Entente  Powers,  not  Japan. 
From  the  point  of  view  of  Oriental  peace,  there  is 
no  absolute  necessity  for  China  to  participate  in  the 
war. 

Sun  Yat  Sen,  the  great  revolutionary  leader 
and  spokesman  for  the  more  enlightened  Chi- 
nese of  South  China  and  Canton,  has  also 
sprung  into  the  arena,  and  makes  a  protest 
against  dragging  China  into  the  war.  In  an 
open  letter  to  the  Prime  Minister  of  England, 
which  appeared  in  the  papers  under  the  date 
of  March  7,  he  says: 

To  His  Excellency  Lloyd  George,  London. 

Your  Excellency:  As  a  patriot  of  China  and 
grateful  friend  of  England,  to  whom  I  owe  my  life, 
I  deem  it  my  duty  to  point  out  to  you  the  injurious 
consequences  to  China  and  England  caused  by  this 
agitation  of  some  of  your  officials  here,  to  bring 
China  into  the  European  conflict.  I  have  been  ap- 
proached by  prominent  English  to  consider  the  ques- 
tion of  China  joining  the  Allies.  After  careful  study 


180  PEKING  DUST 

I  come  to  the  conclusion  that  it  would  be  disastrous 
to  both  countries  should  China  break  her  neutrality. 

For  China  is  yet  an  infant  Republic  and  as  a 
nation  she  may  be  likened  to  a  sick  man  just  enter- 
ing the  hospital  of  constitutionalism.  Unable  to 
look  after  herself  at  this  stage,  she  needs  careful 
nursing  and  support.  Therefore  China  cannot  be 
regarded  as  an  organized  country.  She  is  held  in- 
tact only  by  custom  and  sentiment  of  a  peace-loving 
people.  But  at  once,  should  there  arise  discord,  gen- 
eral anarchy  would  result. 

Hitherto  the  Chinese  possessed  unbounded  faith 
and  assurance  in  the  strength  of  England  and  her 
ultimate  triumph,  but  since  the  agitation  by  short- 
sighted though  well-meaning  people,  while  some  Eng- 
lish dailies  even  advocate  the  sending  of  several  Chi- 
nese divisions  into  Mesopotamia,  this  confidence  has 
been  greatly  shaken. 

Should  China  enter  the  war,  it  would  prove  dan- 
gerous to  her  national  life  and  injurious  to  the  pres- 
tige of  England  in  the  Far  East.  The  mere  desire 
to  get  China  to  join  the  Allies  is  to  Chinese  minds 
a  confession  of  the  Allies'  inability  to  cope  with 
Germany.  Just  now  comes  Premier  Tuan's  report 
to  the  President  that  the  Entente  Powers  are  coerc- 
ing China  to  join  the  Allies.  Already  the  question 
has  raised  bitter  dissensions  among  our  statesmen. 
Discord  now  may  evoke  anarchism  which  will  arouse 
the  two  strong  but  perilous  elements  in  China,  anti- 


FROM  A  SCRAP-BOOK        181 

foreign  fanatics  and  Mohammedans.  Since  our 
revolution,  anti-foreign  feelings  have  been  suppressed 
by  us,  but  anti-foreign  spirit  lives  and  may  take  ad- 
vantage' of  the  critical  time  and  rise  in  another 
Boxer  movement  with  general  massacre  of  foreigners. 
If  war  is  declared  against  any  country,  the  ignorant 
class  cannot  distinguish  one  nation  from  another, 
and  consequences  would  be  more  fatal  to  England, 
owing  to  her  larger  interest  in  the  Orient. 

Again,  the  Mohammedans  cannot  be  overlooked. 
To  fight  against  their  Holy  Land  would  be  a  sacri- 
lege. 

The  worst  results  of  anarchism  in  China,  I  fear, 
would  be  dissension  among  the  Entente  Group,  which 
would  surely  mean  disaster  to  the  Entente  cause. 
Under  such  conditions  and  at  this  critical  juncture, 
China  cannot  be  expected  to  do  otherwise  than  main- 
tain strict  neutrality. 

My  motive  for  calling  your  Excellency's  attention 
to  this  injurious  agitation  is  actuated  not  purely  by 
the  desire  to  preserve  China  from  anarchy  and  disso- 
lution, but  prompted  by  my  warmest  sympathy  for 
a  country  whose  interest  I  have  deeply  at  heart,  and 
whose  integrity  and  fair  name  I  have  every  reason 
to  uphold  and  honor. 

SUN  YAT  SEN. 


IX 

THE   GERMAN   REPLY 

THE  German  Government  has  sent  a  re- 
ply to  China's  protest,  a  most  concilia- 
tory note,  saying  that  it  is  extremely  sorry  to 
hear  that  China's  shipping  has  suffered  so 
greatly  through  the  submarine  warfare,  and 
that  if  China  had  protested  sooner,  had  sent 
any  word  as  to  her  specific  losses,  the  matter 
would  have  been  looked  into  at  once.  As 
China  has  never  had  any  ships  that  navigate 
in  European  waters,  or  in  other  seas  included 
in  the  war  zone,  this  solicitous  reply  was  not 
without  irony.  I  quote  the  reply: 

To  the  Minister  of  Foreign  Affairs  of  the  Republic 

of  China. 

Your  Excellency:  By  the  instructions  of  ray 
home  government,  which  reached  me  at  7  P.  M.  on 
the  10th  instant  [March  10,  1917],  I  beg  to  for- 
ward you  the  following  reply  to  China's  protest  to 

182 


THE  GERMAN  REPLY        183 

the  latest  blockade  policy  of  Germany:  The  Im- 
perial German  Government  expresses  its  great  sur- 
prise at  the  threat  used  by  the  Government  of  the 
Republic  of  China  in  its  note  of  protest.  Many 
other  countries  have  also  protested,  but  China,  which 
has  been  in  friendly  relations  with  Germany,  is  the 
only  state  which  has  added  a  threat  to  its  protest. 
The  surprise  is  doubly  great  because  of  the  fact  that 
as  China  has  no  shipping  interests  in  the  seas  of 
blockaded  zones,  she  will  not  suffer  thereby. 

The  Government  of  the  Republic  of  China  men- 
tions that  loss  of  life  of  Chinese  citizens  has  occurred 
as  the  result  of  the  present  method  of  war.  The 
Imperial  German  Government  wishes  to  point  out 
that  the  Government  of  the  Republic  of  China  has 
never  communicated  with  the  Imperial  Government 
regarding  a  single  case  of  this  kind,  nor  has  it  pro- 
tested in  this  connection  before.  According  to  re- 
ports received  by  the  Imperial  Government,  such 
losses  as  have  been  actually  sustained  by  Chinese 
subjects  have  occurred  in  the  firing  line  while  they 
were  engaged  in  digging  trenches  and  other  war 
service.  While  thus  engaged,  they  were  exposed  to 
the  dangers  inevitable  to  all  forces  engaged  in  war. 
The  fact  that  Germany  has  on  several  occasions  pro- 
tested against  the  employment  of  Chinese  subjects 
for  warlike  purposes  is  evidence  that  the  Imperial 
Government  has  given  excellent  proof  of  its  friendly 
feelings  towards  China.  In  consideration  of  these 


184  PEKING  DUST 

friendly  relations  the  Imperial  Government  is  willing 
to  treat  the  matter  as  if  the  threat  had  never  been 
uttered.  It  is  reasonable  for  the  Imperial  Govern- 
ment to  expect  that  the  Government  of  the  Republic 
of  China  will  revise  its  views  respecting  the  question. 

Germany's  enemies  were  the  first  to  declare  a 
blockade  on  Germany,  and  the  same  is  being  per- 
sistently carried  out.  It  is,  therefore,  difficult  for 
Germany  to  cancel  her  blockade  policy.  The  Im- 
perial Government  is  nevertheless  willing  to  comply 
with  the  wishes  of  the  Government  of  China  by  open- 
ing negotiations  to  arrive  at  a  plan  for  the  protec- 
tion of  Chinese  life  and  property,  with  the  view  that 
the  end  may  be  achieved  and  thereby  utmost  regard 
be  given  to  the  shipping  rights  of  China.  The  rea- 
son which  has  prompted  the  Imperial  Government 
to  adopt  this  conciliatory  policy  is  the  knowledge 
that,  once  diplomatic  relations  are  severed  with  Ger- 
many, China  will  not  only  lose  a  truly  good  friend, 
but  will  also  be  entangled  in  unthinkable  difficulties. 

In  forwarding  to  Your  Excellency  the  above  in- 
structions from  my  home  Government,  I  also  beg  to 
state  that,  if  the  Government  of  China  be  willing,  I 
am  empowered  to  open  negotiations  for  the  protec- 
tion of  the  shipping  rights  of  China. 

Imagine  how  disconcerting  that  reply  must 
have  been,  since  China  has  never  had  any  ships 
in  the  war  zone.  Still  less  has  she  had  any 


THE  GERMAN  REPLY        185 

that  have  been  or  might  possibly  be  sunk. 
With  that  excuse  cut  from  under  her,  she  is  at 
present  under  the  painful  suspicion  that  this 
desire  to  uphold  the  sanctity  of  international 
law  has  been  imposed  from  without.  One  is 
almost  forced  to  the  conclusion  that  it  is  im- 
posed by  those  nations  which  themselves  have 
been  most  flagrant  violators  of  international 
law,  upon  Chinese  territory.  But  be  that  as 
it  may. 

So  much  has  been  happening  lately,  that 
perhaps  I  have  forgotten  to  mention  a  certain 
phase  of  international  activity  referred  to  in 
the  German  reply,  that  is,  the  employment  of 
Chinese  subjects  behind  the  firing-lines  in  Eu- 
rope. For  a  year  past  Chinese  coolies  have 
been  recruited  for  service  in  France,  paid  of 
course,  though  probably  not  paid  liberally,  nor 
told  frankly  what  they  are  being  let  in  for. 
The  French  colonies  have  also  been  drafting 
their  subjects  for  work  in  France.  When  we 
went  down  to  the  tropics  in  December,  we  trav- 
eled on  a  ship  gathering  coolies,  mobilized  not 
as  soldiers  but  as  laborers.  The  captain  of 


186  PEKING  DUST 

our  ship  told  us  that  up  to  date  (December, 
1916)  France  had  already  imported  some  forty 
thousand  Annamites  for  work  in  munition  fac- 
tories, agricultural  work,  and  noncombatant 
service  behind  the  lines.  The  ship  we  were  on 
was  carrying  some  fourteen  hundred  of  these 
little  men,  packed  like  sardines  in  the  hold, 
which  had  been  transformed  into  a  sort  of 
fifth-rate  lodging-house,  with  tiers  of  bunks 
for  the  accommodation  of  these  little  coolies. 

Each  French  ship  of  this  particular  line, 
going  through  the  Mediterranean,  carries  be- 
tween a  thousand  and  fourteen  hundred  of  such 
laborers;  and  what  the  effect  of  this  will  be 
upon  the  next  generation  of  Frenchmen  re- 
mains to  be  seen.  They  were  pretty,  docile 
little  creatures,  to  be  turned  loose  in  villages 
and  in  the  provinces,  which  villages  and  prov- 
inces have  been  bereft  of  men  these  many 
months,  and  where  no  race  prejudice  exists 
among  the  women.  Many  Frenchmen  we 
have  met  deplored  this  state  of  things,  and  its 
probable  effect  upon  the  population  of  France. 
War  is  not  very  pretty,  no  matter  from  what 


THE  GERMAN  REPLY        187 

angle  you  look  at  it.  And  now  that  the  Chi- 
nese are  being  imported  as  well,  the  situation 
may  become  worse.  AJI  article  entitled 
"China's  Gift  to  the  War  in  Human  Labor  and 
Human  Life,"  has  this  to  say: 

Of  far  greater  menace  to  Chinese  interests  [than 
the  German  submarine  blockade]  is  the  understand- 
ing which  the  Chinese  Government  is  contemplating 
to  make  with  France,  Russia  and  Britain,  for  the 
despatch  of  laborers  to  Europe.  The  Chinese  Gov- 
ernment wants  to  indulge  in  coolie  traffic.  Bad  busi- 
ness at  any  time,  and  worse  now. 

This  business  of  sending  Chinese  laborers  to  these 
countries  has  been  going  on  for  over  a  year.  It  is 
done  without  regard  to  the  interests  of  the  people, 
or  the  wish  of  the  Government.  The  companies  for 
organizing  the  emigration  were  supposed  to  be  under 
the  inspiration  of  Mr.  Liang-Shih-Yi,  who  was  sure 
of  making  a  few  dollars  on  every  coolie's  head.  The 
Chinese  who  have  gone  have  been  with  Chinese  cogni- 
zance, but  not  under  Chinese  protection.  The  busi- 
ness was  of  private  or  semi-official  character,  not  of 
official  character. 

For  several  months  English  missionaries  in  the 
province  of  Shantung  have  been  war-agents  of  the 
British  Government  for  securing  laborers  for  France 
and  England.  This  has  been  done  of  late,  at  least, 
contrary  to  the  wishes  of  the  Chinese  provincial  au- 


188  PEKING  DUST 

thorities.  Thus  the  English,  like  the  Japanese  in 
Shantung,  have  been  going  their  own  free  way,  with- 
out regard  to  the  Chinese  Government.  The  policy 
is  bad  missionary  policy ;  the  business  is  bad  mission- 
ary business. 

However,  I  ask  myself — I  who  am  nothing 
if  not  fair-minded — why  should  n't  mission- 
aries act  as  recruiting-agents  ?  What 's  the 
use  of  spending  years  converting  heathen  into 
Christians,  if  they  are  not  to  act  as  Christians? 
Why  should  there  be  any  scruples  ahout  en- 
listing converts  for  a  "Holy  War"?  They 
might  as  well  "do  their  hit"  for  civilization, 
Christian  civilization.  Besides,  "the  blood  of 
the  martyrs  is  the  seed  of  the  Church."  More- 
over, the  Treaty  of  Tientsin,  in  1858,  which 
legalized  the  sale  of  British  opium,  also  legal- 
ized the  practice  of  Christianity  in  China.1 

1  See  Appendix  II. 


X 

DUST  AND   GOSSIP 

1  DON'T  suppose  a  country  can  go  to  war, 
without  first  having  a  war  spirit.  If  the 
enemy  does  n't  rouse  this  spirit,  does  n't  pro- 
voke it,  then  some  one  else  must.  The  ideal 
war,  I  suppose,  is  the  one  in  which  the  enemy 
furnishes  the  incentive.  Poor  old  China  has 
now  got  to  go  to  war,  but  it  is  mighty  uphill 
work  to  create  the  war  feeling.  Since  Ger- 
many has  not  provoked  it,  it  must  be  manufac- 
tured somehow,  and  the  task  is  now  devolving 
upon  those  foreign  influences  which  will  benefit 
if  China  goes  to  war.  They  are  getting  to 
work  rapidly  and  adroitly,  but  the  situation  re- 
quires some  diplomacy.  It  is  so  difficult  to 
incite  feeling  against  one  foreign  nation  with- 
out inciting  it  against  them  all.  The  poor 
Chinese  can't  distinguish.  They  can't  under- 
stand why  they  should  be  especially  irate 

isa 


190  PEKING  DUST 

against  Germany  at  the  moment,  when  rank- 
ling uppermost  in  their  minds  is  the  recent 
French  grab  of  Lao  Hsi  Kai,  and  the  still 
more  recent  deal  of  the  Shanghai  Opium  Com- 
bine. It  is  so  difficult  to  fan  the  flame  yet  not 
cause  too  great  a  conflagration.  It  requires 
nice  discrimination,  and  these  poor  old  heathen 
minds  have  a  quaint  logic  of  their  own.  The 
game  is  amusing,  interesting,  from  the  stand- 
point of  the  detached  onlooker. 

Roughly  speaking,  the  people  of  a  nation 
may  be  grouped  into  two  classes,  the  inciters 
and  the  fighters.  They  are  not  the  same  peo- 
ple, as  a  rule.  The  inciters  usually  work  in  the 
rear,  as  noncombatants  or  molders  of  public 
opinion.  In  China — China  being  what  it  is, 
in  the  circumstances,  and  all — the  noncombat- 
ants who  have  assumed  this  task  of  arousing 
the  war  spirit  are  foreigners.  A  delicate  task, 
this  arousing  resentment  against  one  set  of 
foreigners  without  arousing  it  against  all.  It 
means  diplomacy  of  the  first  water.  Thus,  the 
foreign  press  is  very  insistent  that  the  Huns 
be  got  rid  of.  One  English  paper  naively  re- 


DUST  AND  GOSSIP  191 

marks:  "We  do  not  like  to  see  Germans  free 
to  wander  about  our  streets  at  will."  Which 
is  well  enough  in  its  way,  although  it  must  be 
galling  to  the  Chinese  to  have  outsiders  refer 
to  the  streets  of  China  as  "ours."  Americans 
would  resent  such  a  remark  made  by  a  for- 
eigner concerning  the  streets  of  New  York. 

If  only  the  European  nations  had  been  as 
decent  to  China  as  America  has  been!  Then, 
in  this  crisis,  China  would  have  turned  to  them, 
been  guided  by  them,  with  the  same  trust  that 
she  places  in  America.  As  it  is,  she  distrusts 
all  Europe  to  the  core. 

And  over  all  this  whirling  dust  of  rumor  and 
gossip,  hatred  and  ill  feeling,  there  has  been 
raging  for  the  past  three  days  a  physical  dust- 
storm  of  tremendous  intensity.  The  yellow, 
overhead  kind,  sifting  downward  in  clouds  of 
powder,  and  covering  everything,  inside  and 
out.  The  China-boys  about  the  hotel  tell  us 
with  superstitious  awe  that  when  a  dust-storm 
lasts  more  than  three  days  it  is  "bad  joss." 
Such  a  storm,  of  a  week's  duration,  preceded 
the  outbreak  of  the  Chinese-Japanese  War. 


192  PEKING  DUST 

Every  one  feels  uneasy,  the  whole  atmosphere 
is  full  of  depression,  tension,  and  suspense. 
One  can't  think  or  talk  of  anything  but  this 
impending  disaster. 

This  afternoon  we  went  out  for  a  while  to 
forget  it,  if  we  could.  We  went  to  the  Lung 
Fu-Ssu,  a  sort  of  rag-fair  held  every  ten  days 
in  the  grounds  of  an  old  temple  in  the  East 
City.  It 's  a  wonderful  fair,  usually,  with 
booths  and  stalls  stretching  in  every  direction, 
and  spreading  all  over  the  ground,  underfoot 
as  well.  Everything  is  sold  at  this  bazaar, 
everything  made  in  China  or  ever  made  in 
China,  to-day  or  in  the  remote  past, — porce- 
lain, bronzes,  jade,  lacquer,  silks,  clothing, 
toys,  fruits,  food,  curios,  dogs  and  cats.  Three 
times  a  month  everything  of  every  description 
finds  its  way  to  the  Lung  Fu-Ssu,  and  three 
times  a  month  all  foreign  Peking,  to  say  noth- 
ing of  native  Peking,  finds  its  way  to  the  tem- 
ple grounds  to  look  for  bargains.  To-day, 
however,  it  was  n't  much  fun :  neither  the  na- 
tive city  nor  the  legation  quarter  were  out  in 


DUST  AND  GOSSIP  193 

force,  for  the  dust  was  too  thick,  the  air  too 
cold. 

Indefatigable  bargain-hunters  as  we  were, 
we  could  not  stay  long;  but  I  don't  believe  it 
was  because  of  the  overwhelming  dust;  it  was 
just  sheer  nervous  anxiety  to  get  back  to  the 
hotel  for  the  latest  news.  We  are  all  restless 
and  anxious,  and  withal  feel  ourselves  so  ut- 
terly impotent  to  avert  this  impending  calam- 
ity. Therefore,  as  I  say,  we  did  n't  stay  long 
at  the  fair, — just  long  enough  for  me  to  buy 
a  pair  of  little,  ancient,  dilapidated  stone  lions, 
which  the  man  assured  me  were  of  the  Ming 
dynasty.  My  first  venture  into  Ming.  They 
looked  it,  anyway,  when  I  bought  them.  I  laid 
them  at  my  feet  in  a  newspaper,  and — I  sup- 
pose the  jolting  of  the  rickshaw  did  it — when 
we  reached  the  hotel,  the  Ming  had  all  rubbed 
off.  They  were  stone  lions  of  the  purest 
plaster. 

We  found  a  note  from  the  minister  asking 
us  in  for  tea,  so  we  brushed  ourselves  hastily 
and  went  over  to  the  legation  to  find  a  large 


194  PEKING  DUST 

crowd  of  dusty  people  assembled,  in  the  beau- 
tiful, spacious  drawing-rooms.  Every  one 
was  talking  politics,  discussing  the  situation 
fore  and  aft,  and,  as  usual,  arriving  nowhere. 
At  the  end  of  an  hour  there  was  a  stir  caused 
by  the  arrival  of  C ,  one  of  the  young,  im- 
portant Members  of  Parliament.  He  stood 
surrounded  by  an  enquiring  group,  hands  hid- 
den up  the  capacious  sleeves  of  his  crackling 
brocade  coat,  while  he  sucked  in  his  breath  with 
hissing  noises,  in  deference  to  the  honorable 
company.  "Good  news!"  he  exclaimed,  "good 
news !  Or  so  I  think  you  '11  find  it!  We  have 
just  decided  to  break  with  Germany!" 

There  wasn't  what  you'd  call  rejoicing; 
instead,  his  rather  hilarious  announcement  was 
greeted  with  a  sort  of  constrained  silence. 
It 's  such  a  tremendous  thing  for  any  country 
to  declare  war,  and  for  a  country  in  China's 
position  it  is  such  a  blind  leap  into  the  abyss. 
However,  the  matter  is  not  yet  quite  decided : 
the  first  vote  is  taken,  but  the  final  has  yet  to 
be  cast.  Parliament  has  been  sitting  all  day. 
This,  of  course,  merely  means  the  severance  of 


DUST  AND  GOSSIP  195 

diplomatic  relations,  but  the  next  step  must 
follow  as  the  night  the  day. 

I  must  tell  you  of  an  incident  that  occurred 
the  other  day,  when  we  were  at  tiffin  at  the 
home  of  some  English  acquaintances.  But 
first  I  must  tell  you  about  the  pailows,  and  be- 
fore that  again,  I  must  tell  you  of  the  French 
ships  that  carry  troops.  I  don't  know  where 
to  begin,  for  you  must  hear  everything  if  you 
are  to  see  the  point. 

I  '11  start  with  the  pailows,  those  big,  red 
lacquer  memorial  arches  that  span  the  streets 
all  over  the  place — arch,  by  the  way,  being  a 
figure  of  speech,  since  actually  these  arches 
are  square,  and  consist  of  two  upright  posts 
with  a  third  laid  horizontally  across  them. 
They  are  emblazoned  all  over  with  gilded  char- 
acters and  sprawling  dragons,  and  honor  some 
great  Chinese, — erected  to  his  memory  instead 
of  a  library  or  a  hospital  or  something  like  that. 
Well,  there  is  one  pailow  or  memorial  arch  that 
is  not  of  red  lacquer  but  of  white  marble, 
erected  not  in  honor  of  a  Chinese  but  in  honor 
of  a  foreigner,  the  imposing  von  Kettler  Me- 


196  PEKING  DUST 

morial  which  spans  Ha-Ta-Men  Street,  far 
out.  It  is  a  Lest-We-Forget  memorial  placed 
in  honor  of  Baron  von  Kettler,  the  German 
minister  who  was  killed  in  the  Boxer  uprising. 
Chinese  characters  and  German  letters,  carved 
in  marble,  tell  the  tale  of  von  Kettler's  death 
to  all  who  pass  beneath.  Now  to  the  ships. 
Three  months  ago  when  we  went  down  to  the 
tropics,  we  happened  to  travel  on  French  ships, 
two  of  them  loaded  to  the  gunwales  with  troops 
for  France,  labor  battalions.  The  passengers, 
I  may  mention,  came  off  rather  badly,  being 
squeezed  into  exceedingly  restricted  quarters 
in  order  to  make  room  for  the  troops.  The 
first  ship  we  were  on  carried  a  thousand,  the 
other  one  twelve  hundred  of  these  little  An- 
namites;  the  number  varies  according  to  the 
size  of  the  vessel.  Really,  you  know,  I  don't 
think  it 's  quite  fair  to  either,  to  carry  both 
troops  and  passengers  on  the  same  ship. 
Well,  at  tiffin  to-day  we  heard  what  seemed 
like  a  most  astounding  proposal.  Our  host 
was  explaining  his  plan  for  dealing  with  the 
von  Kettler  Memorial.  The  Athos  was  sunk 


DUST  AND  GOSSIP  197 

February  17,  in  the  Mediterranean,  together 
with  five  hundred  Chinese  soldiers.  And  here 
were  we  listening  to  a  suggestion  to  erase 
the  inscription  on  the  von  Kettler  arch,  and 
substitute  a  new  one  dedicating  the  pailow 
to  the  five  hundred  "Chinese"  troops  torpedoed 
by  the  Germans.  It  seems  to  me  rather  late 
in  the  day  to  begin  inscribing  pailows  to  Chi- 
nese killed  by  the  conquering  foreigner.  To 
create  the  war  spirit  it  may  be  necessary  to 
dedicate  the  von  Kettler  pailow  to  this  pur- 
pose, but  as  a  precedent  it  seems  rather  un- 
wise,— leads  one  into  sweeping  vistas  of  all  the 
pailows  of  China,  all  the  thousands  innumer- 
able of  red  lacquered  pailows,  all  insufficient 
in  their  thousands  to  contain  the  names  of  the 
still  greater  thousands  of  Chinese  slain  by  their 
European  conquerors. 


XI 

DIPLOMATIC    RELATIONS   BROKEN 

IT  'S  done  at  last.  China  has  at  last  broken 
diplomatic  relations  with  Germany  this 
fourteenth  day  of  March,  1917.  The  foreign 
press  is  triumphant,  while  the  Chinese  press  is 
much  less  enthusiastic,  its  rejoicings  far  less 
obvious.  Here 's  a  bit  of  gossip  for  you, 
blown  along  with  the  dust  of  Peking.  ( By  this 
time  you  must  have  discovered  that  Peking 
dust  and  Peking  gossip  are  pretty  much  the 
same  thing,  whirling  and  blowing  along  to- 
gether, sifting  over  you  and  into  you,  physi- 
cally and  mentally,  till  you  are  saturated 

through  and  through.)     Miss  Z told  us 

this ;  she  knows  every  bit  of  rumor  in  Peking, 
from  topside  down: 

"What  do  you  suppose  happened,  just  two 
hours  after  the  final  vote  was  taken,  and  the 

note  despatched  to  the  German  minister  an- 
us 


RELATIONS  BROKEN         199 

nouncing  China's  decision?  X—  [one  of 
the  Allied  ministers]  was  seen  ramping  up  and 
down  before  the  German  legation,  shaking  his 
fist  at  the  German  flag  flying  up  above  and 
shouting,  'That  thing  must  come  down !  That 
thing  must  come  down!'  Had  two  Japanese 
soldiers  with  him,  they  say — where  he  got  them 
heaven  knows — but  there  he  was,  fairly  raging, 
and  stomping — that 's  the  word,  stomping— 
up  and  down  and  shaking  his  fist  at  the  flag, 
and  shouting  that  it  must  come  down !" 

"Why  didn't  he  wait  till  the  Chinese  took 
it  down?" 

"Lord  only  knows,  my  dear!  Wasn't  it 
amusing!  Could  such  things  happen  any- 
where except  in  Peking?" 

It  appears,  however,  that  while  X—  -  was 
pacing  up  and  down  before  the  German  lega- 
tion, shaking  his  fist  at  the  flag  and  furiously 
impatient  at  Chinese  slowness,  the  wily  Chi- 
nese were  engaged  upon  other,  more  important 
matters.  Hauling  down  the  flag  could  wait; 
it  was  less  urgent.  The  astute  Chinese,  with 
admirable  foresight,  hastily  "acquired"  the 


200  PEKING  DUST 

German  concessions  in  Tientsin  and  Hankow 
for  themselves — acted  with  remarkable  intel- 
ligence and  great  haste,  almost  undue  haste, 
before  any  of  the  foreign  powers  could  "ac- 
quire" or  "protect"  these  concessions  for  them- 
selves; put  their  own  Chinese  soldiers  in  pos- 
session, and  with  the  utmost  promptness  occu- 
pied these  German  holdings  in  the  name  of 
the  Republic  of  China.  Imagine  the  shock! 
Furthermore,  with  the  same  speed,  they  also 
seized  the  interned  German  war-ships. 

Well,  this  is  a  tremendous  decision  for  China 
to  have  reached,  and  the  next  step,  declaration 
of  war,  will  be  still  more  momentous.  Oppo- 
sition is  growing  all  the  while,  in  spite  of  the 
rupture  of  diplomatic  relations,  which  does  not 
mean  that  this  country  will  declare  war  imme- 
diately, automatically,  as  a  matter  of  course. 
Those  in  favor,  and  those  who  resist,  are  lining 
up  for  a  tremendous  struggle,  and,  as  I  wrote 
you  before,  some  say  that  civil  war  will  result. 

One  thing  stands  out  clearly, — our  whole 
visit  to  the  East  has  confirmed  it, — and  that  is 
that  this  European  war  had  its  origin  in  the 


RELATIONS  BROKEN         201 

Orient.  Supremacy  in  the  Orient,  control  of 
the  Far  East — that  is  the  underlying  cause  of 
the  struggle  which  is  rending  Europe  in  twain. 
The  world  does  not  go  to  war  for  little  stakes, 
for  trifles.  It  rights  for  colossal  stakes,  worth 
gambling  for. 


XII 

WALKING  ON   THE  WALL' 

DON'T  think  that  even  in  all  this  excite- 
ment our  taste  for  shopping  has  become 
quiescent.  Far  from  it!  Shopping  freshens 
one  up,  relaxes  one's  mind,  makes  one  more 
keen  for  the  next  bit  of  rumor  that  comes 
along.  We  know  where  all  the  antique-shops 
are  situated,  those  along  Ha-ta-Men  Street, 
out  on  Morrison  Street,  in  the  Tartar  City,  all 
those  without  the  Wall,  and  those  in  the  Chi- 
nese City,  as  well  as  the  pawnshops  down  the 
lower  part  of  Chi'en  Men  Street,  the  Thieves' 
Market,  and  all  the  various  bazaars.  And  we 
know  the  days  on  which  the  temple  fairs  are 
held.  We  know  all  about  them  and  get  bar- 
gains every  day,  sometimes  real  finds,  and 
sometimes  stone  lions  of  the  purest  Ming,  such 
as  I  described  a  few  days  ago.  And  in  the 
intervals,  when  we  are  not  out  questing  on 

202 


WALKING  ON  THE  WALL    203 

our  own,  the  dealers  and  runners  from  the 
various  shops  appear  at  our  door,  bow  them- 
selves in  with  such  ingratiating  compliments 
that  we  can't  resist,  and  then  stoop  over  and 
undo  wonderful  blue  cotton  bundles  and  ex- 
hibit such  treasures  that  there  Js  no  withstand- 
ing them.  The  most  irresistible  of  all  these 
dealers  is  "Tiffany"  (his  Chinese  name  has 
given  way  to  this  nickname,  which  is  solemnly 
printed  on  his  card) ,  dealer  in  jewels  and  jade, 
a  giant  Chinese  about  six  feet  tall,  weighing 
some  three  hundred  pounds,  with  the  smiling, 
innocent  face  of  a  three-foot  child!  When 
Tiffany  enters  the  room  and  squats  down  over 
his  big  blue  bundle,  his  knees  spread  out,  he 
looks  like  a  wide  blue  elephant,  and  there  is 
no  refusing  his  bland,  smiling,  upturned  face, 
his  gentle,  "No  buy.  Just  look-see."  Then 
from  the  bundle  come  strings  of  pearls,  trans- 
lucent jade  of  "number-one"  quality,  snuff- 
bottles  fit  for  a  museum.  The  only  way  of 
getting  rid  of  him  is  to  tell  him  that  a  new 
American  lady  has  just  arrived  on  the  floor 
below,  whereupon  he  gathers  up  his  treasures 


204  PEKING  DUST 

and  goes  in  search  of  her!  His  method  of 
gaining  admittance  to  our  room  is  ingenious. 
A  gentle  knock,  and  we  open  to  find  the  door- 
way suffused  by  Tiffany. 

"No  want  things  to-day,  Mr.  Tiffany.  No 
can  buy." 

To  which  comes  the  pleasant  reply:  "No 
want  Missy  buy.  Come  bring  Missy  cum- 
shaw." 

A  slender  hand  slips  around  the  open  door, 
against  one  side  of  which  I  press  my  knee 
while  he  braces  a  huge  foot  against  the  other, 
and  in  the  hand  lies  a  red  leather  box  painted 
with  flowers  and  dragons.  "Present  for 
Missy ;  cumshaw,"  says  the  pleasant  voice,  and 
what  can  you  do?  "Amelican  lady  you  say 
down-stair,  she  buy  heap  pearls,  so  I  bring 
Missy  cumshaw."  Whereupon  in  he  comes, 
with  his  gratitude  for  the  American  lady,  his 
bargains,  his  wheedling,  and  we  are  lost! 

After  some  weeks  of  this — Tiffany  and 
others,  and  our  own  excursions — our  room  be- 
came a  veritable  curio-shop,  and  our  curios 
were  so  overlaid  with  spring  dust  which  the 


WALKING  ON  THE  WALL    205 

"boys"  had  failed  to  remove  that  we  called  in 
a  packer  one  day,  had  everything  boxed,  and 
resolved  to  buy  nothing  more.  On  this  after- 
noon, March  16,  we  went  over  to  the  legation 
compound  to  arrange  with  our  consul  for  in- 
voices, and  as  we  crossed  the  compound  Dr. 
Reinsch  appeared  from  his  house,  and  came 
over  and  spoke  to  us.  He  looked  very  tired 
and  troubled,  showing  the  strain  of  the  last 
few  weeks. 

"I  've  just  had  word  from  the  Chinese  For- 
eign Office,"  he  said,  "that  the  Russian  Gov- 
ernment has  been  overturned!"  He  had  no 
details,  just  the  mere  fact,  but  the  shock  was 
so  great  that  we  forgot  all  about  our  visit  to 
the  consul,  forgot  our  intention  to  obtain  an 
invoice;  all  we  wanted  to  do  was  get  off  and 
talk  it  over!  We  flew  back  to  the  hotel,  sim- 
ply bursting  with  the  news !  It 's  so  exciting, 
in  this  old,  barbaric  city,  to  hear  such  news  as 
that,  so  casually,  from  your  minister !  No  one 
in  the  hotel  to  talk  to, — three  o'clock,  a  bad 
hour!  So  we  went  for  a  walk  on  the  only 
available  place  for  a  walk  that  Peking  affords, 


206  PEKING  DUST 

the  top  of  the  wall.  For  you  can't  walk  with 
comfort  in  the  streets,  they  are  too  crowded, 
with  camels  and  wheelbarrows  to  be  dodged  at 
every  turn.  And  as  we  walked  on  the  wall, 
discussing  that  bit  of  tremendous  news,  going 
over  and  over  again  the  possibilities  contained 
in  those  few  words,  we  met  other  people  out 
walking,  also  talking  it  over.  The  French 
minister  and  his  first-secretary  came  by, 
deeply  engrossed  in  conversation.  Some  little 
distance  behind  us  came  Dr.  Reinsch  with  one 
of  the  press  correspondents.  We  met  all  dip- 
lomatic Peking  walking  on  the  wall  that  aft- 
ernoon, talking  it  over!  For  the  wall  is  a 
good  safe  place  for  conversations:  one  can't 
possibly  be  overheard,  for  one  can  see  people 
coming  a  mile  off.  Only  foreigners  may  go 
there :  the  Chinese  are  n't  allowed  on  it,  except 
the  soldiers  at  the  blockhouses  by  the  towers. 
The  most  frequent  visitor  is  the  baby  camel 
owned  by  the  American  marine  guards,  which 
comes  up  to  browse  on  the  weeds  growing  be- 
tween the  stones.  We  once  asked  a  marine 
where  they  found  this  mascot.  "Stole  it  first," 


WALKING  ON  THE  WALL    207 

was  the  reply,  "and  paid  four  dollars  after- 
ward!" 

I  picked  up  a  Tientsin  paper  a  few  days  ago, 
and  was  interested  to  read  an  "Ordonnance" 
promulgated  by  the  French  consul-general  at 
Tientsin.  By  the  terms  of  this  decree  every 
Chinese  employed  in  the  French  concession  is 
obliged  to  have  a  little  book  containing  his 
name,  age,  place  of  birth,  and  so  on,  together 
with  his  photograph  and  finger-prints.  A 
duplicate  cornet  is  on  file  at  the  French  police 
bureau  in  Tientsin,  and  no  Chinese  can  find 
employment  in  the  concession,  as  cook,  groom, 
clerk,  chauffeur,  or  in  any  other  capacity,  un- 
less he  is  first  registered  with  the  police.  The 
idea  of  having  one's  finger-prints  recorded,  like 
a  common  criminal,  seems  somehow  humiliat- 
ing. I  imagine  there  would  be  some  comment 
if  the  Japanese  enforced  such  regulations  in 
their  concessions  in  China. 


XIII 

MEETING   THE   PRESIDENT   OF   CHINA 

EVER  since  we  came  to  Peking  we  have 
been  anxious  to  meet  the  President  of 
China,  Li  Yuan  Hung.  Dr.  Reinsch  said  he 
would  arrange  it  for  us  "at  the  first  opportune 
moment."  Opportune  moments  are  scarce  in 
Peking,  as  you  can  well  imagine ;  consequently 
we  have  been  waiting  for  weeks  for  such  a  mo- 
ment to  arrive,  for  a  pause  longer  than  usual 
between  impeachments  and  betrayals  and  plots 
of  various  kinds.  We  had  waited  so  long,  in 
fact,  that  we  had  quite  forgotten  about  it,  un- 
til we  came  in  one  day  just  before  tiffin  time, 
rather  late,  and  found  the  whole  hotel  in  a  blaze 
of  excitement:  we  were  to  meet  the  President 
that  afternoon! 

And,  what  *s  more,  best  clothes  were  re- 
quired! Really,  I  had  not  foreseen  that  con- 
tingency, and  therefore  felt  uncomfortable  and 

208 


MEETING  THE  PRESIDENT     209 

self-conscious  when  arrayed  in  my  other  hat, 
with  the  feather,  the  hat  which  has  been  re- 
posing in  the  hat-box  for  eight  long  months, 
waiting  for  just  such  an  emergency!  Every 
one  else,  however,  was  in  the  same  state  of  ex- 
citement as  to  dress;  that  is,  all  those  who 
like  ourselves  had  been  long  in  the  Orient, 
and  whose  clothes  had  fallen  off  a  bit  in  ap- 
pearance. In  sharp  contrast  were  the  newly 
arrived  tourists  with  their  smart  new  outfits, 
beautiful- as  only  Americans  can  be  beautiful. 
But  never  mind:  we  reflected  that  the  Presi- 
dent would  never  know  the  difference ;  he  would 
consider  us  all  alike  and  all  outlandish.  There 
were  others  in  the  party  who  had  lived  so  long 
in  Peking  that  they  were  reduced  to  Gillard's 
best, — Gillard's,  the  one  "department  store" 
of  the  city,  about  on  a  plane  with  the  general 
store  of  a  country  village  or  a  frontier  town, 
only  worse.  Sooner  or  later  every  one  in 
Peking  is  reduced  to  Gillard's  Emporium, 
where  the  stocks  are  old-fashioned  and  musty, 
and  the  thing  you  want  has  just  been  sold  out. 
And  if  you  can't  get  it  at  Gillard's,  there  is 


210  PEKING  DUST 

nowhere  else  to  go.  Up-stairs  Mrs.  Gillard 
makes  Paris  gowns  on  the  latest  models,  which 
look  all  right,  too,  till  tourist  season  comes 
round  and  you  see  the  difference.  Well, 
finally  we  were  all  ready,  and  assembled  at  the 
front  door  of  the  hotel, — the  smart  and  beau- 
tiful Americans;  those  clad  in  Gillard's  best, 
and  ourselves,  something  intermediate.  The 
men  were  upset,  too :  several  of  them  had  been 
obliged  to  borrow  top  hats.  And  at  the  last 
moment  a  rumor  spread  that  ceremonial  bows 
were  required.  That  created  such  consterna- 
tion that  several  of  us  considered  backing  out. 
We  were  all  to  meet  at  the  Pei  Hei  Gate  at 
two  o'clock,  so  we  started  early,  for  we  had  a 
long  distance  to  travel.  The  smart  Ameri- 
cans went  in  motors,  as  was  fitting,  but  the 
rest  of  us  made  a  long  procession  of  rickshaws, 
and  jogged  happily  along  the  dusty  streets, 
out  through  the  gates  of  the  legation  quarter, 
past  the  North  Glacis,  through  the  gates  of 
the  Imperial  City,  and  finally,  after  half  an 
hour's  run,  reached  the  Pei  Hei  Gate,  lead- 
ing into  the  old  and  abandoned  Winter  Palace. 


MEETING  THE  PRESIDENT     211 

It  then  transpired  that  a  visit  to  this  old  palace 
was  part  of  the  program,  and  we  were  to  wan- 
der for  two  hours  through  its  beautiful  and 
extensive  grounds,  until  four  o'clock,  when  the 
President  would  receive  us.  Now  March  is 
March  the  world  over,  but  March  in  Peking 
is  excessive.  No  one  who  has  not  passed  a 
spring  in  North  China  can  know  the  mean- 
ing of  dust.  On  this  clear,  bright  March  after- 
noon a  classic  dust-storm  was  in  progress  and 
in  this,  dressed  in  our  best  clothes,  we  were 
to  wander  for  two  hours  through  the  closed 
grounds  of  the  Winter  Palace,  which  had 
been  thrown  open  to  us  by  special  courtesy 
of  the  President! 

They  say  one  never  realizes  the  meaning  of 
the  word  decay  until  one  has  seen  Peking. 
And  the  climax  of  decay  is  reached  here,  in 
this  former  abode  of  the  old  empress  dowager, 
where  everything  remains  as  she  left  it,  or  as 
the  Boxers  left  it,  or  as  the  European  looters 
left  it  after  the  Boxer  troubles.  Scattered 
through  the  beautiful  grounds  are  magnifi- 
cent buildings,  all  fallen  into  ruin.  ,The  roofs 


212  PEKING  DUST 

of  the  palaces  and  temples,  blazing  with  the 
imperial  yellow  tiles,  are  dropping  to  pieces, 
and  rank  grass  is  replacing  the  fallen  tiles  and 
dislodging  those  that  are  left.  In  one  of  the 
temples  we  walked  through  littered  debris  of 
rich  carvings,  kicked  against  the  broken  heads 
and  hands  of  gilded  gods  fallen  from  the  altars, 
and  brushed  against  the  loosened  shreds  of  old 
paintings  swaying  in  tatters  from  the  walls. 
One  building  contained  the  remains  of  a  once 
beautiful  fountain,  painted  and  lacquered, 
now  moldering  and  fallen  into  dust.  At  the 
four  corners  of  the  room  the  old  gods,  life- 
size,  had  been  gathered  into  piles  and  cov- 
ered with  matting,  and  from  beneath  this  dusty 
covering  protruded  dirty,  battered  heads  and 
gilded  bodies,  ludicrous  and  pathetic. 

In  the  grounds  it  was  no  better.  Weeds 
grew  shoulder  high,  springing  from  between 
the  stones  of  the  great  courtyards  and  open 
spaces  connecting  the  temples  and  palaces,  and 
we  pushed  ourselves  through  this  brush,  and 
stumbled  over  rolling  stones,  all  the  while  en- 
veloped by  the  whirling  dust,  the  everlasting 


MEETING  THE  PRESIDENT     213 

Peking  dust,  straight  from  the  Gobi  Desert. 
All  this  was  very  disastrous  to  our  personal 
appearance,  and  at  the  end  of  two  hours  we 
were  all  reduced  to  pretty  much  the  same  level : 
really,  there  was  n't  much  difference  between 
the  beautiful  Americans,  those  attired  in  Gil- 
lard's  best,  and  ourselves,  when  we  took  to  our 
rickshaws  (and  motors)  again  and  set  off  for 
the  President's  palace,  in  the  Forbidden  City. 
The  grounds  of  this  palace  presented  a  much 
better  appearance  than  anything  we  had  seen 
in  Peking.  The  roads  were  newly  swept,  and 
everything  was  very  neat  and  clean  and  or- 
derly, though  bare.  The  lawns,  if  such  they 
could  be  called,  were  as  arid  and  grassless  as 
the  great  plains  of  Chili.  We  arrived  a  few 
minutes  before  four,  and  descended  from  our 
vehicles,  grand  and  otherwise,  and  then  a  clean- 
ing-up  process  took  place.  Dusty  shoes  were 
brushed  off  with  handkerchiefs,  dusty  coats 
slapped  and  patted,  wind-blown  hair  rear- 
ranged, dust  cleaned  out  from  the  corners  of 
eyes,  and  powder-papers  passed  from  hand  to 
hand  among  the  women.  One  lady  remarked 


214  PEKING  DUST 

cheerfully,  "Well,  we  surely  don't  look  very 
nifty  to  meet  the  President,"  but  we  made  our- 
selves as  "nifty"  as  we  could,  in  the  circum- 
stances, standing  together  in  a  laughing  group 
on  the  lee  side  of  the  palace,  and  asking  one 
another  if  we  'd  do.  I  remember  that  once, 
years  ago,  when  I  was  living  in  the  Latin 
Quarter,  some  of  us  went  over  to  a  tea  on 
"the  other  side,"  and  before  pulling  the  door- 
bell, we  stood  first  on  one  foot  and  then  on  the 
other,  polishing  our  dusty  shoes  on  our  stock- 
ings. Well,  here  we  were  doing  the  same 
thing,  before  meeting  the  President  of  China! 
We  got  clean  at  last,  and  then  soberly 
marched  round  the  corner  of  the  building  and 
presented  ourselves  in  the  anteroom  of  the 
palace,  leading  to  the  President's  apartments. 
Here  we  found  Dr.  Reinsch  waiting  for  us, 
and  he  sorted  us  into  groups  of  eight,  and  left 
us  waiting  till  the  summons  came.  In  former 
times  the  mandarins  used  to  wait  in  this  ante- 
room, before  an  audience  with  the  empress 
dowager,  and  we  tried  to  imagine  the  big  bare 
room  of  to-day  filled  with  these  high  officials 


MEETING  THE  PRESIDENT     215 

in  their  gorgeous  robes.  Nothing  remains  of 
the  old  glories  of  the  palace  save  the  elaborate 
carving  on  wall  and  ceiling,  and  a  few  pieces 
of  magnificent  old  furniture.  The  ceiling  is 
now  disfigured  with  a  gaudy,  cheap  European 
chandelier,  while  standing  here  and  there  on 
beautiful  ebony  tables  are  hideous  modern 
vases,  straight  from  the  five-and-ten-cent 
store.  The  floor  was  covered  with  ugly  oil- 
cloth. Such  is  China  modernized,  imbued  with 
Western  culture. 

Our  group  of  eight  was  the  first  to  be  called, 
and  Dr.  Reinsch  led  the  way  with  an  inter- 
preter. We  passed  out  of  the  antechamber 
and  along  an  open  marble  corridor,  lined  with 
Chinese  soldiers  in  their  padded  gray  cotton 
uniforms,  who  stood  at  salute  as  the  American 
minister  passed.  Immediately  we  found  our- 
selves in  another  room,  also  plainly  furnished, 
and  the  next  moment  were  shaking  hands  with 
an  unassuming  little  man  clad  in  a  frock- 
coat,  the  President,  Li  Yuan  Hung.  Through 
the  interpreter  the  President  explained  that 
he  would  like  us  to  pass  into  the  room  beyond, 


216  PEKING  DUST 

where  hie  could  speak  with  us  one  by  one,  per- 
sonally. He  waved  his  hand  toward  the  other 
room,  and  my  recollection  is  that  we  led  the 
way!  It  all  happened  so  quickly,  I  can't  re- 
member; but  somehow  our  group  seemed  to 
be  waiting  in  the  other  room  when  the  Presi- 
dent and  Dr.  Reinsch  arrived  at  our  heels,  a 
second  later.  However,  you  can't  expect  peo- 
ple not  brought  up  in  courts  to  know  much 
about  such  things,  and  we  were  probably  flus- 
tered, anyway. 

President  Li,  Dr.  Reinsch,  and  the  interpre- 
ter stood  together,  while  we  arranged  ourselves 
in  a  semicircle  round  them,  and  then  Dr. 
Reinsch  presented  each  one  of  us  in  turn,  ex- 
plained who  each  one  was,  or  what  he  or  she 
represented  or  had  been  doing.  He  began 
with  the  Aliens, — told  who  Mr.  Allen  was, 
what  big  American  interests  he  represented, 
why  he  had  come  out  to  China,  and  all  about 
it.  Then  the  interpreter  repeated  all  this  to 
the  President,  who  meanwhile  stood  looking 
inquiringly  at  the  Aliens,  as  did  the  rest  of 
us.  When  the  translation  was  finished,  Li 


Courtesy  of  Press  Illustratlug-  Service 

President  Li  Yuan-Huns 


MEETING  THE  PRESIDENT     217 

replied  in  Chinese ;  they  say  he  can  speak  Eng- 
lish, but  imperfectly,  and  he  did  not  attempt 
it.  "When  quality  meets,  compliments  pass." 
Dr.  Reinsch  said  all  manner  of  nice  things 
about  the  Aliens  and  China,  and  the  Presi- 
dent said  all  sorts  vof  nice  things  about  the 
Aliens  and  America,  and  it  all  took  some  time, 
just  disposing  of  the  first  two  of  our  party. 
Meanwhile,  two  servants  came  in  with  a  tray 
of  champagne  and  plates  of  cakes,  and  we  all 
stood  with  a  glass  in  dne  hand  and  a  cake  in 
the  other,  waiting  to  see  what  Mr.  Allen  would 
do  when  the  President  finished  telling  him  how 
glad  he  was  he  had  come  to  China.  Mr.  Allen 
rose  to  it,  however,  in  a  happy  little  speech,  say- 
ing that  it  was  a  privilege,  and  so  on. 

Then  came  our  turn.  We  were  anxiously 
wondering  what  Dr.  Reinsch  could  find  to  say 
about  us  two,  having  committed  himself  by 
introducing  the  whole  group  at  one  swoop  as 
"representative  Americans."  However,  we 
were  both  exceedingly  pleased  at  what  he  did 
say,  and  the  President  was  pleased,  too,  ap- 
parently, for  he  replied  that  he  was  glad  we 


218  PEKING  DUST 

were  like  that.  So  it  continued  all  round  the 
circle,  and  we  felt  exactly  as  if  it  were  the  Day 
of  Judgment,  and  the  secrets  of  all  hearts  were 
being  revealed:  we  thought  we  knew  our 
friends  pretty  well,  and  all  about  them;  yet 
we  hung  with  bated  breath  upon  Dr.  Reinsch's 
introduction  or  send-off!  And  we  had  never 
understood  the  meaning  of  "true  Oriental 
politeness"  until  we  heard  the  President's 
gracious,  courteous  welcome  in  reply.  We 
stood  directly  opposite  him,  and  had  a  good 
opportunity  to  observe  him  closely, — a  short, 
thick-set  man  with  a  small  mustache,  much 
darker  than  the  usual  Chinese  type,  owing  to 
his  heritage  of  Siamese  blood.  Many  people 
say  he  has  no  Siamese  blood  at  all,  but  it  is 
always  like  that  in  China:  whatever  any  one 
tells  you  is  always  flatly  contradicted  by  the 
next  person  you  meet. 

Then  we  committed  a  great  gaffe!     When 

the  Aliens  and  E and  I  had  been  safely 

disposed  of,  and  the  introductions  and  inter- 
pretations were  being  directed  toward  the  other 
four  members  of  the  party,  we  drank  our 


MEETING  THE  PRESIDENT    219 

champagne — we  four,  the  Aliens  and  our- 
selves !  I  think  it  was  because  we  did  not  know 
what  else  to  do  with  it,  having  stood  stiffly  at 
attention  for  some  twenty  minutes,  trying  to 
balance  a  very  full  glass  in  one  hand,  and  con- 
scious that  the  sugary  cake  in  the  other  was 
fast  melting.  Anyway,  we  emptied  our 
glasses,  and  set  them  down  on  a  table  behind 
us,  and  ate  the  cakes  as  well.  Then,  to  our 
horror,  Dr.  Reinsch  summed  us  all  up  again, 
collectively,  in  a  graceful  little  speech,  and  the 
President  raised  his  glass,  and  bowing,  drank 
our  health.  I  heard  E—  whisper,  "The 
glasses,  quick!"  and  the  Aliens  and  she  and  I 
hastily  groped  backward  for  the  empty  glasses 
on  the  table  behind  us,  and  drained  the  few 
remaining  drops  with  what  manners  we  could 
muster.  After  which  we  all  shook  hands  with 
the  President  again,  and  filed  out  of  the  room. 
In  the  anteroom  the  rest  of  the  party 
crowded  round  us,  asking  for  tips.  We  had 
two  big  ones  to  offer :  Don't  lead  the  way  for 
the  President  of  China,  and  don't  touch  your 
glasses  till  he  raises  his! 


XIV 

GREAT  BRITAIN'S  TWELVE  DEMANDS 

THE  scaffolding  is  being  put  up  for  more 
trouble.  China  has  got  to  declare  war, 
and  to  do  it  soon.  It  took  five  weeks'  maneu- 
vering to  make  her  break  diplomatic  relations 
and  will  probably  take  much  longer  to  induce 
her  to  take  this  next  step,  opposition  to  which 
is  growing  stronger  and  more  intense  every 
day.  The  President  is  obstinately  opposed 
to  it,  and  he  has  considerable  backing.  There 
is  free  talk  about  a  revolution  occurring  if  the 
break  takes  place,  so  determined  are  certain 
leaders  not  to  be  dominated  by  "foreign  in- 
fluence." Many  Chinese  can  be  bribed,  but 
the  Chinese  in  general  cannot  be  fooled,  and  no 
glowing  compliments  about  China's  "mascu- 
line" attitude  can  deceive  them  as  to  the  yoke 

they  must  wear  should  they  decide  to  surrender 

220 


GREAT  BRITAIN'S  DEMANDS    221 

themselves  and  place  their  nation  at  the  dis- 
posal of  European  interests. 

On  the  morning  of  March  26  one  of  the 
papers  contained  this  significant  article,  under 
the  caption  of  Tibetan  Affairs: 

Reported  British  Demands.  Indignation  of  Chi- 
nese M.  P.'s.  Mr.  Ho  Sheng-Ping  and  other  Sena- 
tors have  addressed  the  following  interpellation  to 
the  Government:  "According  to  the  reports  of  the 
Japanese  newspapers,  the  British  Government  has 
sent  Twelve  Demands  to  the  Chinese  Government  in 
connection  with  Tibetan  affairs,  and  these  demands, 
being  so  cruel  and  unreasonable,  tend  to  provoke 
the  anger  and  indignation  of  any  people.  Why  did 
we  address  a  protest  to  the  German  Government 
against  its  submarine  warfare?  And  why  did  we 
declare  diplomatic  severance  with  Germany?  Was 
it  not  to  render  assistance  to  the  Entente  Powers, 
and  was  it  not  to  render  direct  help  to  Great  Britain? 
We  are,  indeed,  surprised  at  these  British  Demands 
appearing  in  the  newspapers.  In  accordance  with 
the  provisions  laid  down  in  Article  19  of  the  Pro- 
visional Constitution,  we  hereby  demand  that  a  reply 
be  given  within  five  days  as  to  the  true  nature  of 
the  reported  Demands,  and  the  attitude  of  the  Gov- 
ernment towards  them." 

The  Demands  from  Great  Britain  as  reported  in 
the  Japanese  newspapers  are  as  follows : 


222  PEKING  DUST 

1  Great  Britain  shall  have  the  right  to  construct 

railways  between  India  and  Tibet. 

2  The    Chinese   Government   shall    contract   loans 

from  the  British  Government  for  the  improve- 
ment of  the  administration  of  Tibet. 

3  The  treaty  obligations  between  Tibet  and  Great 

Britain  shall  be  considered  valid  as  heretofore. 
4>  British  experts  shall  be  engaged  for  the  industrial 
enterprises  of  Tibet. 

5  China  shall  secure  the  redemption  of  loans  con- 

tracted from  the  British  people  by  the  Tibetans. 

6  Neither  China  nor  Great  Britain  shall  send  troops 

to  Tibet  without  reason. 

7  The  Chinese  Government  shall  not  appoint  or  dis- 

miss officials  in  Tibet  on  its  own  responsibility. 

8  The  British  Government  shall  be  allowed  to  es- 

tablish telegraph  lines  in  Lhassa,  Chiangchu, 
Chamutao,  etc. 

9  British    postal    service    shall    be    introduced    in 

Lhassa  and  other  places. 

10  China  shall  not  interfere  with  the  actions  of  the 

British  Government  in  Tibet. 

11  No    privileges    or    interests    in    Tibet    shall    be 

granted  to  other  nations. 

12  All  mines  in  Tibet  shall  be  jointly  worked  by 

the  British  and  Chinese  Governments. 

These  Twelve  Demands,  which  the  Chinese 


GREAT  BRITAIN'S  DEMANDS     223 

M.  P.'s  resent  so  hotly,  which  they  quaintly 
term  "cruel  and  unreasonable,"  virtually 
amount  to  the  annexation  of  Tibet  by  the  Brit- 
ish Government.  It  is  amusing  to  think  that 
it  was  the  Japanese  press  which  first  gave  them 
publicity.  We  are  so  accustomed  to  hearing 
of  the  famcms  Twenty-one  Demands  of  Japan 
that  we  fail  to  realize  that  other  nations  make 
demands  equally  sweeping  and  equally  arbi- 
trary. Of  course,  these  British  demands  will 
not  receive  the  world-wide  attention  accorded 
those  of  Japan.  Remember,  over  here  it  is  not 
customary  to  think  of  or  speak  of  anything  but 
"Japanese  aggression."  Japan,  you  see,  of- 
fers the  only  stumbling-block  to  the  complete 
domination  of  the  Orient  by  Europe.  But  for 
Japan — China  might  possibly  become  another 
India.  And  the  Japanese,  facing  race  dis- 
crimination and  exclusion  from  most  of  the 
European  countries,  and  many  of  their  colo- 
nies, as  well  as  America,  cannot  afford  to  have 
China  under  European  control.  It  is  a  ques- 
tion of  self-preservation. 


224  PEKING  DUST 

We  were  dining  the  other  evening  with  a 
Chinese  gentleman,  of  high  position,  who  in- 
vited us  to  dinner  at  an  old  and  very  famous 
restaurant  outside  the  palace  gates.  It  was 
at  this  restaurant,  in  the  days  of  the  dowager 
empress,  that  the  Mandarins  used  to  assemble 
every  night  while  waiting  for  the  imperial 
edicts  to  be  issued  from  the  palace.  And  as  the 
edicts  frequently  did  not  appear  until  two  or 
three  in  the  morning,  they  comforted  them- 
selves, during  this  long  wait,  with  much  fine 
and  delicate  food  cooked  in  the  fine  and  deli- 
cate manner  that  even  French  cooks  cannot 
excel.  And  if  the  cooking  in  those  days  was 
as  delicious  as  at  present,  they  passed  the  time 
very  pleasantly,  and  did  very  well  by  them- 
selves, those  old  officials. 

It  was  a  bitterly  cold  night,  and  the  dark 
street  in  front  of  the  restaurant  was  crowded 
with  a  motley  array  of  rickshaws,  Peking  carts, 
and  motors,  through  which  we  made  our  way 
by  the  light  of  a  bobbing  lantern.  We  en- 
tered a  crowded,  noisy  kitchen,  filled  with  rush- 
ing waiters  and  shouting  cooks  bending  over 


GREAT  BRITAIN'S  DEMANDS     225 

charcoal  fires.  In  contrast  to  the  freezing 
wind  outside  the  air  was  deliciously  warm, 
redolent  with  the  fumes  of  charcoal  and  the 
aroma  of  savory  exotic  food.  Our  table  was 
waiting  for  us  in  a  private  dining-room;  the 
whole  place  consists  of  private  dining-rooms, 
separated  by  good  thick  stone  walls,  so  that 
one  can't  hear  the  plots  and  intrigues  being 
hatched  next  door,  though  the  din  in  the  open 
courtyard  caused  by  the  scrambling,  yelling 
waiters  would  make  that  impossible,  in  any 
event.  The  room  had  a  stone  floor,  and  was 
unheated,  only  a  little  less  cold  than  outdoors. 
Inadvertently,  we  took  off  our  wraps, — not 
all,  only  two  or  three;  for  we  are  becoming 
quite  Chinese  in  our  manner  of  putting  one 
coat  on  over  another.  We  put  them  all  on 
again,  however,  at  the  end  of  the  second  course, 
for  the  draughty  windows  and  the  door  con- 
stantly swinging  open  into  the  courtyard  made 
all  our  warm  things  indispensable. 

Our  Chinese  gentleman  gave  us  a  "num- 
ber-one" dinner,  and  a  number-one  dinner  al- 
ways begins  with  bird's-nest  soup,  the  great- 


226  PEKING  DUST 

est  delicacy  a  Chinese  can  offer ;  also,  the  most 
expensive.  Well,  we  began  with  it,  and  truly 
it  is  "number-one" — gelatinous,  delicate,  with 
an  exquisite  flavor  altogether  indescribable. 
Then  followed  the  other  courses.  As  this  din- 
ner was  given  to  foreigners,  we  had  only  twelve 
courses,  whereas  the  usual  Chinese  dinners  run 
up  into  the  dozens;  "forty  curses"  they  are 
sometimes  called  by  unwary  foreigners  who 
have  tried  to  eat  their  way  through  a  whole 
meal.  The  courses  come  on  and  on,  endlessly ; 
but  the  proper  Chinese  custom  is  that  you  leave 
when  you  have  had  enough,  say  four  or  five. 
You  are  n't  supposed  to  sit  through  an  en- 
tire meal.  Our  host  told  us  that  he  had  been 
to  three  dinners  that  evening,  before  this  one, 
and  was  expecting  to  go  to  one  or  two  more. 
We  felt  rather  uneasy  when  he  told  us  this, 
and  thought  we  ought  to  be  going,  ourselves; 
but  he  hastily  explained  that  this  dinner,  given 
in  our  honor,  was  not  long  and  that  we  must 
go  through  all  of  it.  Very  easy  going,  I  must 
say! 

After  the  bird's-nest  soup  came  shark  fins, 


GREAT  BRITAIN'S  DEMANDS     227 

another  delicacy  and  also  delicious.  Then 
fish,  then  soup  of  another  kind,  then  powdered 
chicken,  then  duck  and  rice,  then  cake,  then 
shell-fish,  then  more  duck,  then  lotus-flower 
soup,  and  finally  fruit  and  coffee.  As  each 
wonderful  dish  succeeded  the  other  our  host 
apologized  profusely,  deprecating  its  poor 
quality  and  miserable  manner  of  preparation. 
We  protested  vehemently,  with  enthusiasm. 
This  also  is  Chinese  etiquette,  it  seems,  for  the 
host  to  denounce  each  dish,  while  the  guests 
eat  themselves  to  a  standstill.  It  all  took  a 
long  time,  for  we  managed  our  chop-sticks 
badly;  nevertheless,  in  spite  of  this  handicap, 
we  finished  every  marvelous  course  placed  be- 
fore us.  A  tea-pot  of  hot  sake  did  some- 
thing to  keep  the  creeping  chill  out  of  our 
bones,  but  very  little:  the  thimble-like  sake 
cups  contained  only  a  few  drops,  and  one 
does  n't  like  to  ask  for  the  tea-pot  more  than 
seventeen  times !  During  the  meal  Mr.  Y- 
entertained  us  with  many  side-lights  on  the 
political  situation,  and  we  finally  asked  him 
to  explain  the  meaning  of  the  Twelve  British 


228  PEKING  DUST 

Demands.     He  replied  promptly,  emphatic- 
ally. 

"They  are  a  threat,"  he  said,  "a  form  of 
coercion,  to  make  us  take  the  next  step,  to 
declare  war.  If  we  declare  war,  they  will  be 
withdrawn.  We  are  familiar  with  them. 
They  have  appeared  before,  when  it  was  neces- 
sary." 


XV 

CONCLUSION 

ON  the  first  of  April  we  are  going  to 
leave  Peking,  to  leave  China  alone  to 
her  fate!  We  have  had  enough  of  it,  and  are 
just  about  worn  out  with  the  strain  on  our 
sympathies.  Opposition  to  a  declaration  of 
war  is  growing  daily,  and  so  are  rumors  of  a 
revolution.  But  a  revolution  is  just  what  is 
needed, — a  revolution  which  will  unseat  those 
who  are  opposed  to  the  war,  and  which  will 
place  in  power  a  group  of  officials  submissive 
and  subservient  to  European  influence.  A 
revolution  will  offer  the  grand,  final  excuse  for 
the  "protection"  of  China,  by  Europe.  You 
will  see;  mark  my  words.  Only,  of  course, 
Japan  will  not  be  the  power  that  sets  in  order 
this  disturbed  country.  Never  Japan,  the 
great  commercial  competitor.  For  by  this 
time  you  must  surely  understand  that  Japanese 

229 


230  PEKING  DUST 

aggression  is  immoral  and  reprehensible, 
whereas  European  aggression  or  "civilization" 
is  the  fate  to  which  the  Orient  is  predestined. 
The  world  contains  a  double  standard  of  in- 
ternational justice,  for  the  East  and  the  West. 

At  least  we  are  glad  to  have  been  in  China 
during  these  distressful  days,  just  to  see  how 
they  do  it.  With  the  attention  of  the  world 
centered  on  Europe,  things  are  taking  place 
out  here  which  could  not  possibly  occur  were 
the  world  free  to  know  of  them,  and  judge. 
But  in  the  safe  seclusion  of  Oriental  isolation 
all  things  are  now  possible.  Back  of  the  war, 
behind  the  war,  ugly  things  are  going  on,  which 
will  be  all  finished  and  done  with  and  safely 
accomplished  by  the  time  the  war  is  over. 
This  war  for  civilization  is  all  that  "civiliza- 
tion" requires  in  the  way  of  opportunity  in  the 
Orient. 

So  we  are  going  to  leave  Peking,  gorgeous, 
barbaric  Peking,  with  its  whirling  clouds  of 
gossip  and  its  whirling  clouds  of  dust.  We 
are  stifled  by  them  both.  We  are  going  to 
Japan  to  see  cherry-blossoms. 


APPENDIXES 


APPENDIX  I 

This  despatch  appeared  in  "The  New  York 
Times,"  the  last  of  July  or  the  first  part  of  August, 
1918: 

FEAR  OPIUM  TRADE  REVIVAL  IN  CHINA 

BRITISH    PROTEST   LODGED   AGAINST    LARGE    TRACT    OF 
POPPV    UNDER    CULTIVATION    IN    SHENSI.     GOVERN- 
MENT is  HELPLESS.     AREA  is  PRACTICALLY  RULED  BY 
BANDITS.     MAY  TRY  TO  ENFORCE  THE  LAW. 
From  a  Special  Correspondent.     Peking,  May  27,  1918: 
One  of  the  very  few  things  which  China  has  done  well 
is  the  suppression  of  the  opium  practice  with   all  its 
baneful    influences.     Under    the    spur    of    enlightened 
foreign    opinion,   the    Chinese   have    rid   themselves    of 
opium  much  earlier  than  was  arranged  for,  and  in  their 
thoroughness   actually  defied  conventions  to  which  the 
British  Government  was  a  party. 

This  in  other  circumstances  might  have  awkward  con- 
sequences. But  those  who  took  the  risk  knew  that  the 
British  people  would  not  tolerate  the  continuance  of 
opium  importation  into  China  even  if  it  did  involve  the 
violation  of  certain  agreements. 

For  several  years  now  China  has  been  certified  as  free, 
that  is  to  say,  the  cultivation  of  the  poppy  has  been  en- 
tirely discontinued.  Of  course  the  habit  has  not  been 
completely  eliminated — that  takes  time — and  the  fact 

233 


234  APPENDIX  I 

that  a  demand  for  the  drug  exists  is  sufficient  temptation 
for  greedy  officials  and  unscrupulous  speculators  to  con- 
nive at  renewed  attempts  to  cultivate  the  poppy  and 
resume  its  sale  and  use. 

The  state  of  lawlessness  which  prevails  in  China  in- 
vites disregard  of  authority,  especially  when  it  affords 
lucrative  possibilities,  and  the  continued  enfeeblement 
of  the  administration  in  Peking  contributes  to  conditions 
favoring  the  resumption  of  the  traffic  in  opium. 

It  is  not  surprising,  therefore,  to  learn  that  reports 
have  been  received  by  the  British  Legation  in  Peking, 
of  large  tracts  being  under  poppy  cultivation  in  Shensi, 
a  province  where  lawlessness  is  rampant,  and  where  the 
unfortunate  residents  are  harassed,  plundered  and  mur- 
dered by  large  roving  bands  of  Tufei,  the  Chinese  equiv- 
alent for  robbers  or  thieves.  The  reports  come  from 
missionaries  and  foreign  travellers  and  naturally  they 
could  not  be  ignored. 

Accordingly,  the  British  Minister  has  lodged  a  pro- 
test with  the  Chinese  Government.  Under  the  Opium 
Convention,  Indian  opium  may  be  imported  into  China  as 
long  as  the  poppy  is  cultivated  in  China.  That  is  the 
legal  aspect,  but  in  these  days  of  higher  ideals,  it  may 
be  presumed  that  Sir  John  Jordan  and  the  British  Gov- 
ernment, which  he  represents,  are  more  concerned  with 
the  moral  aspect.  His  protest  is  not  made  in  the  inter- 
ests of  Indian  opium,  but  in  the  hope  that  the  national 
regeneration  from  a  former  vice  should  not  suffer  a 
relapse. 

The  reply  of  the  Chinese  Government  is  not  known, 
but  it  is  safe  to  infer  that  assurance  would  be  given  that 
orders  would  be  issued  to  the  provincial  authorities  to 


APPENDIX  I  235 

enforce  the  law  prohibiting  the  cultivation  of  the  poppy. 
Whether  these  orders  will  be  obeyed  is  not  so  certain. 
Gone  are  the  days  when  edicts  from  Peking  con- 
cluded with  the  warning,  "  tremble  and  obey."  Then 
they  were  heeded,  but  now  the  authority  of  the  Govern- 
ment does  not  seem  to  extend  beyond  the  metropolitan 
area,  and  however  ready  the  administration  may  be  to 
suppress  poppy  cultivation,  it  is  unable  to  control  the 
more  distant  feudal  tuchuns.  How  then,  can  a  Govern- 
ment be  held  responsible  when  it  is  not  in  a  position  to 
enforce  its  authority?  This  problem  meets  the  treaty 
powers  at  every  turn.  One  or  several  must  act  as  did 
Alexander  the  Great  when  he  cut  the  Gordian  knot. 
Who  or  which  shall  it  be  ? 

From  an  article  in  the  "North  China  Herald," 
dated  September  14,  1918 : 

The  Government  [Chinese]  after  concluding  the 
opium  deal,  farmed  the  right  to  sell  the  drug  in 
Chekiang,  Hupeh  and  Kiangsu,  to  a  specially  formed 
company,  called  the  Hsichi  Company. 

We  read  further  in  the  article  that  the  Hsichi 
Company  bought  opium  from  the  Chinese  Govern- 
ment at  the  rate  of  10,000  taels  per  chest,  which  it 
sells  to  district  farmers  at  23,000  taels  per  chest, 
and  these  latter  retail  it  to  drug-stores  or  consum- 
ers at  27,000  taels  per  chest. 

From  Millard's  "Review  of  the  Far  East,"  Oc- 
tober 12,  1918  : 

It  would  be  advisable  for  the  Peking  government  to 
seriously  consider  the  notes  addressed  to  it  on  the  sub- 


236  APPENDIX  I 

ject  of  opium  by  the  British  and  American  governments. 
The  trade  in  opium  cannot  any  more  be  successfully  re- 
vived in  China  than  could  the  African  slave  trade,  and  if 
Peking  proposes  to  make  a  few  dollars  by  the  sale  of 
the  over-plus  opium  stock  at  Shanghai  the  venture  is 
dangerous.  Only  a  few  years  ago  China  gave  her 
pledge,  in  the  presence  of  the  assembled  nations  at  The 
Hague,  that  the  poppy  plant  should  never  again  be  cul- 
tivated within  her  borders,  nor  would  the  traffic  in 
opium  be  tolerated,  and  in  the  notes  from  the  British 
and  American  governments  the  pledge  given  at  The 
Hague  is  brought  directly  to  the  attention  of  those  in 
authority  at  Peking.  The  two  Western  governments 
named  would  hardly  have  taken  such  concurrent  action 
without  a  significant  meaning,  and  a  meaning  which 
Peking  will  not  be  permitted  to  treat  with  indifference 
and  impunity.  It  is  certainly  not  the  policy  of  either 
British  or  American  governments  to  interfere  in  the  do- 
mestic affairs  of  China,  but  both  of  those  governments  do 
intend  that  no  business  shall  be  carried  on  as  demoraliz- 
ing and  offensive  to  the  moral  sense  of  the  world  as  the 
business  of  debauching  and  drugging  with  opium.  Lon- 
don and  Washington  really  do  not  appear  to  be  fully  en- 
lightened as  to  conditions  at  Peking  and  the  motives 
and  inspirations  influencing  officials  in  that  Capital,  and 
a  reformation  there  is  as  much  needed  as  in  Russia.  It 
may  be  written  that  at  no  time  in  Chinese  history,  dur- 
ing the  past  two  hundred  years,  has  the  name  of  China 
been  so  disparaged  and  her  reputation  besmirched. 
Representatives  of  the  Allied  nations  and  America  are 
in  Russia  charged  with  the  duty  of  aiding  in  bringing 
about  the  unity  of  the  Russian  people  that  they  may: 


APPENDIX  I  237 

establish  a  stable  government,  and  representatives  of  a 
similar  character  for  a  like  purpose  are  as  much  needed 
in  China.  Russia  will  soon  have  a  stable  government, 
the  choice  of  her  people,  but  China  promises  to  go  on 
unsettled  so  long  as  Peking  governs  as  at  present. 

From  the  "New  York  Times,"  November  25,  1918: 
CHINA  TO  DESTROY  OPIUM 

1,200  CHESTS  TO  BE  BURNED  IN  DEFERENCE  TO  ALLIED 
REPRESENTATIONS 

Copyright,  1918,  by  The  New  York  Times   Company. 
Special  Cable  to  "  The  New  York  Times." 

PEKING,  Nov.  23. — The  Government  has  decided  to 
destroy  the  remaining  stocks  of  opium  in  Shanghai  in 
deference  to  Anglo-American  representations.  Three 
hundred  chests  have  been  sold,  and  1,200  will  be  burned 
in  presence  of  the  allied  representatives,  the  Government 
making  a  virtue  of  necessity. 

America  to  the  rescue !  It  must  have  been  a  close 
gqueak  for  poor  old  China. 


APPENDIX  II 

From  the  "New  York  Medical  Record,"  October 
12,  1918: 

THE   ORIGIN  OF   THE   SO-CALLED  "SPANISH 
INFLUENZA" 

BY  JAMES  JOSEPH  KING,  A.B.,  M.D. 

NEW  YORK 
CAPTAIN  MEDICAL  CORPS,  U.  S.  ARMY 

We  desire  to  present  in  this  preliminary  note  a  consid- 
eration of  the  similarity  of  the  present  epidemic  to  the 
epidemic  of  pneumonic  plague  which  broke  out  in  Har- 
bin, China,  in  October,  1910,  and  spread  rapidly  and 
continuously  throughout  Northern  China  at  that  time; 
and  to  suggest  that  this  epidemic  may  be  the  same  dis- 
ease modified  by  racial  and  topographical  differences. 
The  origin  of  this  epidemic  was  suggested  to  the  writer 
soon  after  its  outbreak  in  our  camps  by  Mr.  Guy  M. 
Walker,  an  eminent  American  authority  on  Chinese 
affairs.  This  suggestion  led  to  an  investigation  of  the 
reports  of  the  pneumonic  plague  in  China  and  there  is 
sufficient  likeness  of  that  epidemic  to  the  present  one 
prevailing  in  our  cities  and  army  camps  to  warrant  a 
consideration  of  it. 

In  the  latter  part  of  1910  the  pneumonic  plague  first 
appeared  in  Harbin  a  town  in  Manchuria  under  Chinese 

238  " 


APPENDIX  II  239 

control.  Harbin  is  on  the  Trans-Siberian  Railroad, 
and  was  the  original  hotbed  of  the  disease.  The  plague 
had  prevailed  in  Russia  previous  to  November,  1910, 
but  the  Russians,  alert  to  its  danger,  took  immediate 
action  and  stamped  it  out.  It  was  believed  that  the 
plague  was  carried  into  Harbin  by  the  fur  dealers  and 
by  the  Chinese  laborers  returning  to  their  homes  to 
celebrate  New  Year's  Day,  a  custom  universally  ob- 
served in  China.  From  Harbin  the  plague  rapidly 
spread  in  all  directions,  usually  following  the  lines  of 
traffic  along  the  railroads.  It  spread  as  far  south  as 
Chefu,  a  seaport  town,  probably  having  been  carried 
there  by  Chinese  coolies  returning  from  the  north. 

This  plague  has  been  very  serious  The  mortality  has 
been  fearfully  high.  It  has  spread  throughout  China. 
Wherever  the  Chinese  coolies  from  the  North  have  trav- 
eled they  have  carried  this  disease.  From  1910  up  to 
1917  China  has  not  been  free  from  it.  The  writer  has 
heard  of  several  cases  being  present  in  Peking  last  year. 

In  the  early  part  of  1917,  about  200,000  Chinese 
coolies,  collected  from  the  northern  part  of  China,  where 
the  pneumonic  plague  has  raged  at  intervals  since  1910, 
were  sent  to  France  as  laborers.  Part  of  them  were 
sent  around  through  the  Mediterranean;  some,  perhaps 
the  majority,  were  sent  across  the  Pacific,  and  then 
through  Canada  and  America,  to  be  transported  across 
the  Atlantic  to  France.  Trainloads  of  these  coolies 
were  sent  in  solid  trains  across  the  United  States  to 
New  York  and  thence  to  France.  They  made  splendid 
laborers  in  France,  and  were  in  back  of  the  lines  during 
the  German  drive  of  March,  1918.  No  doubt  many  of 


240  APPENDIX  II 

them  were  captured  by  the  Germans  at  that  time. 
Hence  the  outbreak  of  it  in  the  German  army  and  its 
rapid  spread  in  Spain. 

So  far  as  we  know,  this  disease  first  broke  out  last 
spring,  in  the  German  army,  where  it  is  said  to  have 
been  very  serious.  We  next  heard  of  it  in  Spain,  hence 
the  name  Spanish  influenza.  The  name  is  really  a  mis- 
nomer, but  it  has  stuck  probably  because  it  is  the  first 
epidemic  of  influenza  that  Spain  has  ever  had.  Since 
our  soldiers  and  sailors  have  been  returning  from  the 
battlefields  of  France  it  has  become  very  prevalent  and 
serious  in  our  camps  and  cities  all  over  this  country. 

...  It  seems  possible  that  the  Bacillus  pestis  may 
have  been  present  in  a  non-virulent  state  in  the  Chinese 
coolies,  and  assumed  new  virulence,  vigor,  and  a  some- 
what different  form,  when  transplanted  into  virgin  soil. 
The  high  mortality  and  infectivity  of  this  epidemic 
strongly  suggest  it. 

On  this  basis  the  epidemics  which  have  followed  all 
great  wars  may  be  explained.  If  a  nation  or  tribe  can 
survive  any  disease  long  enough  it  will  acquire  immunity 
to  that  disease.  When,  however,  foreign  people  com- 
mingle freely  and  intimately,  as  in  war,  epidemics  will 
break  out.  The  inactive,  non-virulent  organisms  in  one 
race  will  become  virulent  in  some  other  race  which  has 
not  acquired  immunity  to  that  specific  organism. 


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